Ceramic Sculpture - Monkey In Shinto Garb By Shinkai Kanzan (1912-2011) Japan - Signed

Ceramic sculpture - Monkey wearing Shinto garb by Shinkai Kanzan (1912-2011) Japan - signed on bottom: 寛山 (Kanzan)

Okimono representing Saru 申—ninth sign of Chinese zodiac :The Monkey, 3pm-5pm, west-southwest, July.
The Shinto garb makes the figure resemble Masaru 神猿, the sacred monkey who can overcome all obstacles and prevail against all evil.
Comes in a wooden tomobako (storage box)
Artist: Shinkai Kanzan 新開寛山, 1912- 2011
Measurements: 
width 13cm
height 20cm

Shinkai Kanzan was born in 1912 and learned from Kiyomizu Rokubei VI.
From 1952, he is elected a Japanese National Treasure of ceramics. 
He came from a distinguished line of Kyoto artists, his grandfather being Seifu Yohei III a very famous Kyoto potter.
Shinkan was awarded innumerable prizes, one being at the 1939 San Francisco Expo right before his career was interrupted and he was forced to go to Siberia with the military. He was in a Russian Gulag until 1948 when he came back to Japan and resumed his art.
He won the Gold Prize at the 1951 Japanese Art Expo.
In 1951 he was recognized with the Gold Award at the Japanese Art Expo. Following many prizes.
In 1974 he was granted the Governors prize at the Nitten, and in 1980 the Niohon Geijutsu-in Sho (Japanese Art Academy prize). 
In 1989 he was awarded the Kyoto Prefectural Cultural Order of Merit for his life-long career.
Works by him are held in the Kyoto National Museum of Modern Art among others.

https://www.modernjapaneseceramics.com/items/1055211/Modern-Japanese-Pottery-Vase-by-Shinkai-Kanzan