A Hand Painted Ko Ema: Vestigial Horse Image

early to mid twentieth century
image size: 5" x 6 1/2", 12.5 cm x 16.5 cm

This is an ema.  An ema is a votive tablet offered by an individual to a Shinto temple either in petition for a favor or in thanks for a favor received.  Some ema can be very large and hand painted.  They can depict battle scenes, sailing ships or other elaborate images.  

Ko ema, such as this one, are small votives which are to be bought by visitors at a shrine. Anyone who has been to a Shinto shrine in Japan has seen racks outside the shrine which are crowded with hundreds of ema-- however the new ema are not hand painted as this one is.

It was said that there were itinerant makers of ema that would position themselves outside shrines, hand painting them and selling them to the visitors of the shrine. If true, this was likely done in collaboration with the shrine as ema are a source of revenue.

The very faded, almost-barely perceptible and beautifully colored image on this ko ema is that of an elegant horse that is dressed in equally elegant festival finery. There was a tradition of offering a Shinto shrine the gift of an actual horse, but as that was an unrealistic type of donation for most people, ema were painted with the image of horses in order to satisfy this desire to give a horse to a designated shrine.

A delightful object with a delicately rendered and beautiful image, this is certainly a ko ema to consider owning.

The exhibition provenance of this piece should be noted. It was included in the show, "Ema: Votive Plaques from Japan" at The Douglas Hyde Gallery, Dublin, in 2013.

Very recommended.