Height: 27 1/2 inches, 70 cm

Yokota Hosai (1899-1975), sometimes referred to as Yokota Minesai, was born in 1899 in Matsuyama, Ehime Prefecture. He began showing his bamboo pieces at the Ministry of Commerce and Industry Exhibitions in the 1930s.  In 1955 he became one of the seventeen founding members of the Japan Bamboo Artists Association, along with Kosuge Sho¯ chikudo and Iizuka Sho¯ kansai. From 1960 to 1974, he regularly participated in the Japanese Traditional Art Crafts exhibitions. His work is in the permanent collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

Height: 23 1/4 inches, 59 cm

Iizuka Sounsai, (art name Kyokusho) was born in 1876. He was a brother of Iizuka Rokansai and Iizuka Hosai who are both bamboo artists also. He worked in Tokyo, and liked to work with slat bamboo. Several bamboo baskets by Kosuge Kogetsu are in the collections of The Asian Art Museum, San Francisco.

Height: 23 1/4 inches, 59 cm

This finely made ikebana basket was made by the workshop of the Togeppo Saiokuji Temple in Shizuoka city, Shizuoka prefecture. The Temple is famous for crafting bamboo objects. The poet Socho (1448-1532), a master of linked verse who served the Imagawa family, passed his final years at the hermitage here. A designated historic site, the temple is renowned for its dry landscape garden modelled on that of Ginkakuji in Kyoto. In keeping with its name (Togeppo means “moon peeking from mountains”) it is famed as a moon-viewing spot.  It is also known for its bamboo forest.