A highly decorative and finely hand-painted pair of Japanese Satsuma vases, signed for Manpei, Kobe, Japan, dating to the early Showa period, circa 1930s–1940s. The pair is especially attractive for its generous size, balanced proportions and exceptionally detailed hand decoration, with each vase standing 25.5 cm high and weighing over 1 kg.The bodies are painted with elegant birds among peonies, flowering branches, blue blossoms, grasses and soft landscape forms. The quality of the brushwork is notably high: the birds’ feathers, eyes and breast plumage are carefully rendered with very fine linear detail, while the surrounding flowers and foliage are enriched with dense gilt outlines and small-scale hand-painted accents. The overall effect is rich, refined and highly decorative, with the cream crackle-glazed ground providing the classic Satsuma surface against which the gilding and colours stand out beautifully.The necks, shoulders and feet are finished with broad gilt bands an...