Tiered Food Box with Summer and Autumn Fruits

Tiered Food Box with Summer and Autumn Fruits

Shibata Zeshin

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This box, designed for the storage and serving of sumptuous edibles at festive occasions, has a continuous design of summer and autumn fruits, including grapes, melons, loquats, and pears. The lacquer ground is a rich, very dark brown decorated with metal and colored lacquer applied using a variety of techniques to create the different fruits.

Asian Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Tiered Food Box with Summer and Autumn FruitsTiered Food Box with Summer and Autumn FruitsTiered Food Box with Summer and Autumn FruitsTiered Food Box with Summer and Autumn FruitsTiered Food Box with Summer and Autumn Fruits

The Met's collection of Asian art—more than 35,000 objects, ranging in date from the third millennium B.C. to the twenty-first century—is one of the largest and most comprehensive in the world. Each of the many civilizations of Asia is represented by outstanding works, providing an unrivaled experience of the artistic traditions of nearly half the world.