Asia / Drawings, Photographs, Prints & Watercolours

ISONO BUNSAI (BUNSAI MADAKI). Nagasaki miyage [= Souvenir of Nagasaki].
Nagasaki, Yamato-ya Yoshihei juo, Koka 4 [= 1847]. 23 x 15.5 cm. Text and illustrations printed from 42 woodblocks, probably on kozo (mulberry bark) paper (vertical chainlines about 34 mm apart), with an astrological figure and constellation on the title-page (the Mao Xiu lunar mansion?), 12 double-page and 6 full-page illustrations (a few with Dutch titles as well as Japanese) including a map of Nagasaki harbour (showing the Dutch and Chinese trading factories and three ships), two Chinese merchants at a table in the factory library while their servant unpacks a chest of books, a bedroom with a VOC captain(?) and merchant(?), the latter with his pocket watch and Indonesian servant, a cluster of Japanese ships making a dense forest of masts, a landscape with dozens of kites, another with many people on a bridge over a river, a Dutch VOC ship in great detail, a VOC merchant at dinner with an Indonesian servant and two Japanese geishas, a Dutch woman, an elephant, festivals (one with a dragon and drums), and other landscapes, city views, etc. The texts show a wide variety of writing styles (kaisho, gysho and sosho) with the blocks for many texts (and one illustration) including seals of authors or artists, mostly in tensho (seal characters). Original publishers blue paper wrappers in the traditional Japanese fukurotoji manner, publishers manuscript title-label on front wrapper. [1], 40, [1] double ll. Full description

[JAPANESE FOLDING SCREEN - NANBAN BYOBU - THE PORTUGUESE IN JAPAN]. [A Japanese folding screen, specifically a nanban byôbu, depicting the arrival of a Portuguese ship in Japan].
[Japan, late Edo period (1615-1868)]. 104 x 272 cm (each illustrated panel: ca. 90.5 x 44.5 cm). Ink, watercolours, gold paint, and gold leaf on paper. The image is surrounded by a frame of silk brocade (a narrow frame in burgundy and gold and a wider frame in yellow, gold, and black, with a clear floral pattern; together the frame is 5 cm wide), the whole is mounted on six roiro (black) lacquered wood panels, with gilt metal fittings on the outer corners of the outer panels. The panels are backed with decorative paper. [6 panels]. Full description

[NURSERY CATALOGUE - JAPAN]. Yuri hana shashin [= Drawings of lily flowers, from life].
[Yokohama?, ca. 1875?]. Very large 4to (39.5 x 27.5 cm). 24 Japanese flower drawings in black and grey ink with watercolour and gouaches, on Japanese (kozo/paper mulberry?) paper, with the romanized Japanese name, and the price of the bulbs (in francs and centimes) and sometimes colours or other information in French. Contemporary brown Japanese paste-paper wrappers with a bird and flower motif, stab-sewn at the head. [24] ll. Full description

KEIEN. Kengyu-ka shasei [= Morning glory sketches].
Japan, Meiji 31?, 34-36 [=1898?, 1901-1903]. Very large 8vo? (28 x 20.5 cm). With 85 double-page (mostly botanical) drawings in black ink on Japanese paper, each showing 1, 2 or 3 figures, sometimes with additional detail drawings, nearly all coloured in watercolour and/or gouache and most with captions identifying the subject and/or giving the date. Front wrapper with the title in Japanese in black ink. Wrapper-title plus [85] double-page spreads. Full description

LINSCHOTEN, Jan Huyghen van. Histoire de la navigation ... aux Indes Orientales ... Avec annotations de B. Paludanus, ... Troixiesme edition augmentee.
Including:
LINSCHOTEN, Jan Huyghen van. Le grand routier de mer, ...
[LINSCHOTEN, Jan Huygen van]. Description de l'Amerique & des parties d'icelle, ...
Amsterdam, Evert Cloppenburg, 1638. Folio (32.5 x 21 cm). With 3 title pages (2 from the same full-page engraving and 1 letterpress with an engraving of a ship in a cartouche with 4 inset city views), a nearly full-page engraved portrait of the author in a cartouche with 4 inset views, 42 engraved plates including 6 maps (31 double-page & 11 larger folding). All plates coloured by a contemporary hand. Near contemporary mottled calf, gold-tooled spine. [8], 206 pp.; [4], 181, [1 blank]; [1], [1 blank], “86” [= 80], [2 blank] pp. Full description

[LUTZ, J.A. (engraver) and Haatje Pieters OOSTERHUIS (draughtsman)]. De roemryke overwinning, der Palembangsche expeditie op de rivier de Sounsang in de Oost-Indien, door de Nederlandsche land en zeemagt op den 24 Juny 1821.
[Amsterdam, Js. Groenewoud, ca. 1822].
With:
(2) IDEM. Het naar boord brengen, van den Sultan Machmoed Badaroedin naar Z: M: Schooner de Johanna op de rivier de Sousang in de Oost-Indien op den 27 Junij 1821, na de roemrijke overwinning der Palembangsche expeditie.
[Amsterdam, Js. Groenewoud, ca. 1822].
Plate size ca. 32.5 x 43.5 cm. Two hand-coloured aquatint plates with engraved Dutch title and "Proefdruk" below the image. In passepartouts and uniformly framed behind glass (ca. 53.5 x 63.5 cm). Full description

[MAGIC LANTERN SLIDES]. [Large collection of more than 400 glass positive magic lantern slides].
[Kopenhagen?], [early 20th century]. More than 400 glass slides depicting various motifs related to coal mining, chemical processes and astronomy, as well as topographical motifs from Asia, Africa, China, Europe and America. Housed in the original publisher's wooden boxes. Includes 2 original projectors and 1 camera. Full description

[MAP - ARABIAN PENINSULA]. BRUCE, James. Carte de la mer Rouge, relevée sur celle de James Bruce.
[Egypt, probably Cairo], 1827. Folio leaf (46 x 31.5 cm). Manuscript map in pen and ink with watercolour, with a French text on Middle Eastern hand-made paper. Full description

[PAINTING ON LEATHER - JAPANESE - DESHIMA]. [A birds-eye view of the Dutch trading post on Deshima, Japan with in the background a Dutch three-master anchored in Nagasaki Bay].
[Japan, before 1800]. Drawing size ca. 34 x 39.5 cm; frame size ca. 46 x 51 cm. (Oil?) painting on leather. In a passepartout and framed. Full description

POCOCK, Nicholas. East India views islands headlands &c.
[London, ca. 1790?- ca. 1805]. Ten watercolour coastal profiles in grey and blue, of widely varying sizes (30 to 119 cm long), with contemporary captions and other notes in pencil or black ink. 20th-century brown cloth with the artist's original laid-paper wrappers bound at the end. [10] drawings. Full description