Author Archives: BarbaraAnne

Tokugawa Shogunate Tortoiseshell Wedding Set

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I have never seen a real tortoiseshell Japanese wedding set for sale. This one is not only the real thing, it comes in its original box, which has a family crest of three ivy leaves. This symbol was used on samurai flags and became popular after the 8th shogun of the Tokugawa family, who ruled the Edo era. Their trade policies isolated Japan and its art from the world. Earlier Tokugawa family crests used maple leaves. I am sure the price on this is high, but if you can afford it, I’d call this a buy. In this post I am including another hair comb with the maple-leaf logo of the Shogunate, which also sold on Trocadero.

To compare the logo on the box to the family crest on a hair comb:

Blessed be the Genius…

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Lalique’s cattleya orchid is made of ivory, gold, enamel, horn, and diamonds, c. 1903-1904, and resides in the Cleveland Museum of Art. However, the view we usually see of it does not reveal its secret: what René was really thinking when he made it. Last night, I found the truth. Blessed be the genius who loves a woman’s body with his flowers.

Chinese Comb of Gods

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By The Creative Museum:

This impressive ivory comb features the eight Chinese Gods from the Dao Temple, home of Taoism. The artist portrayed the immortals crossing the sea. Respectively, they represent incarnations of the Chinese people: male, female, old, young, rich, noble, poor, and humble. Zhang Guolao’s drum can augur life. Lu Dongbin’s sword can subdue evil. Han Xingzi’s flute can cause growth. He Xiangu’s Water Lily can cultivate people through meditation. Tie Guaili’s gourd can help the needy and relieve the distressed. Zhong Liquan’s fan can bring the dead back to life. Cao Guojiu’s jade board can purify the environment. Lan Caihe’s basket of flowers can communicate with gods. All of this wisdom was carved into a comb made for export to the Victorian market, c. 1890.

The Innovation of Josephine

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As Napoleon’s passionate love, Josephine, kneels before him at his coronation, she introduced two enduring jewelry designs: a woman’s laurel-leaf tiara and a comb with round stones on a stem, forever to be known as the Peigne Josephine. She is wearing the comb in the middle of her head to secure a braid. Napoleon’s laurel-leaf crown imitated Ceasar’s. But Jacques Louis David’s landmark 1804 painting allows us to contemplate Josephine as one of the great jewelry innovators of her time.

Some Early Edo Masterpieces

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The Tokugawa Shogunate ruled Japan from 1637 to 1867. They closed the country to foreigners, and Japanese decorative arts remained a mystery to the Western World. Although porcelain continued to be exported, Japan did not come out of seclusion until the Meiji Era began in 1868. In the Paris Exposition of 1872, Western artists first saw early Edo combs. Japonisme began. Here are three early Edo masterpieces Paris artists might have seen. The style and shape of these combs gives the artist a large canvas, on which they paint one idea.

I believe this is a painted tortoiseshell comb of a tree branch extending over a lake. Insects are flying about. Where the artist reveals the tortoiseshell adds shadows to the insects. The fish painted on the tines represent the fish underneath the lake. Look at the shading blend from top to bottom. This is a masterpiece.

Edo artists painted on glass, too.

Diamond and Aquamarine Tiara

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Topped by a pear-shaped aquamarine, this tiara was owned by Princess Olga Valerianovna Paley. She was born Olga Karnovitsch on Dec. 2, 1865, married Erich Gerhard von Pistohlkors in 1884, had an affair with Grand Duke Paul Alexandrovich of Russia, married him without the Tsar’s approval, but then got his blessing and became a Princess. After her husband and son were killed by the Bolsheviks in 1920, she fled to Finland with her two daughters. She died in Paris on November 2, 1929. Being a woman, no matter what happened to her, she kept the tiara. It is signed Cartier Paris, Londres, New York, was made c. 1912, and sold for $76,000 at Sotheby’s on May 12, 2009.

The Bargain

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Amidst the cacophony of egos, E-bay is a war game. To sell collectibles, you either have to organize in real life to limit supply, as in the paperweight market; throw a piece of junk on ebay with the goal of attracting a private buyer, as in the Tiffany Studios market; but sometimes the collector wins the war because the seller is blindingly stupid.

PCMalady listed this comb as plastic. It wasn’t plastic. It was a Chinese ivory comb made for export to the Victorian market, c. 1890.

I couldn’t believe it. For four days I had a kill snipe bid on this. I knew the people who noticed it would behave like stealth tigers looking to take advantage of the seller’s ignorance. I also knew no one who noticed would bid to draw attention to the comb, thereby jacking up the price. I deleted my snipe bid because I thought “What are you doing? You can’t buy combs now.” I watched.

A comb I’d value at around $300 because there was a slight discoloration to the ivory in the back, invisible to the front, went for $39.99.

Even if the seller did not know the detailed floral decoration was one of the most popular patterns in Chinese ivory export combs, she should have seen the individuality of the discoloration on the back and known the comb was not plastic.

There were only two bidders, feedback scores of 2078 and 3309, respectively. That tells you a lot about their knowledge. The comb was won by the Creative Museum. I am happy about this. It was a brilliant buy.

At the moment, sellers on Ruby Lane are trying to sell their combs for retail prices on E-bay. The listings will not succeed because the main product of E-bay is the war game of egos.

Please welcome the Creative Museum

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I am honored to announce that the founders of The Creative Museum have joined me to become authors on this blog.

The museum’s extraordinary collection includes magnificent works from Africa, North and South America, Europe, Asia, and the South Sea Islands, and also spans centuries. Just as it took a world-class collector’s eye to gather such combs, it took the same eye to photograph them so carefully. The Creative Museum has written a history of the world through comb making.

As I get older, I realize that the convictions I had when my energy was boundless were not the lone leaves on the tree at the end of the world. I was not alone. My conviction that hair combs were profound works of art was shared.

And now, our audience of art lovers and comb collectors can enjoy other points of view. The most wonderful addition is that Creative Museum posts will be written in French! I will translate them into English in the comments section.

Bonne chance, mes amis!

Peine Del Viento (Wind Comb)

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Piene Del Viento II (1959) by Eduardo Chillada is being auctioned at Sothebys in London on Feb. 11, 2011, for an estimated price of $1,269,439. It will go higher.

Using steel, Chillada chose a comb as a metaphor to bring wind to life. He saw the wind as an invisible hand that combed the sea and the woods as well as the hair of men and women. This early sculpture is a hand opening its fingers to let the wind of the open seas pass through them.

Eduardo Txillida Juantegi (in Basque) was a sculptor who gave life to space and emptiness.

In a dialogue with his friend Martin Heidegger, they both understood space as a material medium, and the body as already beyond itself.

Chillada wrote, “I believe in perception, which is riskier and more progressive than experience. Perception is the present with a foot firmly planted in the future. Experience is the present, with your foot planted in the past.”

The most famous Peine Del Viento, number XV, is a set of three massive, haunting abstract steel forms, which emerge out of the rocks of the Bahía de la Concha (Shell Bay) al final de la Playa de Ondarreta (at the end of Ondarreta Beach) en San Sebastián, País Vasco. (in the northern Spanish city of San Sebastián, Basque Country.)