Netsuke: conusschelp

Manju netsuke uit de afgezaagde top van een conusschelp, Anonymous: Netsuke made of Conus shell The concepts of wabi and sabi in tea ceremony utensils will always remain some of the most difficult in Japanese culture. They involve some notion of a not directly obvious naturalness, at least not so obvious to the uninitiated spectator. There is also an aspect of a natural feeling, or tangibility, and an artlessness, unsophistication, in other words, being uncontrived. This netsuke may well be perfectly suited to illustrate these concepts more readily. This is a netsuke, an object with the very practical purpose of preventing the loss of necessary implements worn by men hanging from the sash. It is attached to such implements, a tobacco pouch, for example, or a tiered medicine-box, inro, by means of a silk cord. By sliding the netsuke and the cord under and behind the sash, it then serves as a stopper, and one cannot loose one's tobacco pouch or medicine-box. The maker of this netsuke apparently found or obtained a shell of the Conus family, of which he sawed off the top part. As a result, the basic pattern became the spiral winding of the inside of the shell. Normally, when using a flat cross-section of elephant, narwhal, walrus or pot-whale tooth - a quite common type of netsuke - a simple coin with a hole in the centre would serve as the aid to attach the cord. In this case, in turn, the shell's spiralled inside inspired him to apply a piece of metal featuring a pattern of comma-shaped tomoe, somewhat reminiscent of the yin-yang symbol or the magatama found in historical times as adornment or signs of status. They are here executed in gold and set against a dark shakudo ground, a shiny black metal alloy consisting of copper with 2 to 5 per cent gold. Moreover, extremely small blossoms, equally of gold, are inlaid in the shakudo base. The result is an at first sight very simple and natural shape defined by the natural shell, with the chique of the precious metal plaque repeating the spiral of the shell's inside. This is the direct simplicity and naturalness required in wabi-ness and sabi-ness. This description was given for the ASEMUS virtual master pieces project.