SPECIAL SUBJECTS
passed. Hirata Sōkō recently exhibited in Tōkyō a silver game-cock with soft plumage and surface-modelling of the most delicate character. It had been made by means of the hammer only.
Suzuki Gensuke's name is associated with a tour-de-force which not only shows high skill but also gives very beautiful results. It is a process called kiri-bame (insertion). The decorative design, having been completely chiselled in the round, is then fixed in a field of different metal in which a design of exactly similar outline has been cut out en bloc. The result is that the picture has no blank reverse. For example, on the surface of a shibu-ichi box-lid are seen the backs of a flock of geese chiselled in silver, shakudo, and gold, and when the lid is opened, their breasts and the under-sides of their pinions appear. The difficulty of such work can be easily appreciated. It is necessary that microscope accuracy should be attained in cutting out the space for inserting the design, and further that the design should be soldered firmly in its place, while not the slightest trace of the solder, or the least sign of junction, must be discernible between the metal of the inserted picture and that of the field in which it is suspended. Suzuki Gensuke is not the only expert who works in this style, but to him it owes its origin.
In order to avoid confusion of nomenclature it will be well to refer here to another kind of work called kiri-kame-zōgan (inserted inlaying). Of this the originator was Toyoda Kokō. The gist of the process is that a design chiselled à jour has its outlines veneered with some other metal which serves to emphasise them. Thus, having pierced a spray of flowers in a thin sheet of shibuichi, the artist fits a
313
