Tray style basket in the form of a large sake gourd, with a loop-style, branch bamboo handle across the inset shoulders, off of which run two, thin branch bamboo sections connected to a small section of heavier branch bamboo, suggestive of the cording and netsuke used to suspend the flask from a belt. Woven of dark-purple, smoked and split bamboo with dyed rattan. With a fitted and removable, hammered copper liner. Signed on the reverse with an incised signature by the artist: Shukinsai Kore wo Tsukuru or Made by Shukinsai (Shukinsai, active early Showa era, circa 1926 – 1944). Showa era, circa 1930 – 1940.

With the tomobako or original box, inscribed on the exterior of the lid: Morikago or Tray Basket for Displaying Seasonal Fruit and Leaves; and on the reverse of the lid: Mei: Tai Kai or Titled: Great Ocean; and signed: Shukinsai Saku or Made by Shukinsai, and sealed.

Though a morikago, this basket was also fitted with a hammered copper liner for flower arranging.

Shukinsai likely studied under the Kansai artist Wada Waichisai III (1899 – 1975). The rich color of the smoked bamboo and the oxidation of the box exterior indicate a pre-war dating.

Shukinsai pairs strands of satin-skinned, split bamboo back to back for the face of the basket, so that both the front and back of the tray gleam with the elegant, deep color.

He weaves with an abstracted version of hemp leaf plaiting (asa-no-ha). Heavy, diagonal simple wrapping (bo-maki) binds the rim.

Across the inset shoulder of the gourd, twists a heavy section of branch bamboo, anchored on one side with a bent section of smaller branch bamboo, linked to small finger bamboo sections that end with a cylinder of the branch bamboo like the looped cording to a netsuke. Large double interlocking V knots in stained rattan anchor the handle sections.

The slightly irregular form suggests the regular, curving sides of a sake gourd, with the handle the cording. So the title, Great Ocean, refers both to the rippling surface of the basket and its unusually large scale; but implicitly to the magical rice wine gourd of Chinese immortals and sages.