Self-carved, self-printed; titled, signed and dated in pencil along the bottom margin, Light Mirror, Water Mirror, AP (artist’s proof), A. Uchima, with artist’s circular monogram, AU, 1977
21 1/2 by 30 3/8 in., 54.5 by 77.2 cm
This print is from the last major series the artist undertook before suffering from a serious stroke in 1982, when he was in the prime of his life at the age of only 61. Although over a six-month period he was able to recover some mobility, lingering effects of the stroke forced him to all but abandon the production of woodblock prints.
Three years later a retrospective exhibition of his work was held at Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, New York, where Uchima had taught for 20 years (1962-82). The exhibition catalogue included an essay by Una Johnson (1905-1997), the Curator Emerita of Prints at the Brooklyn Museum, in which she commented at length regarding the series: “It skillfully records in strong abstract images the progression of a visual diary of considerable scope. Composed of layers and remembered landscapes, it is set within great depths of space where intensified colors are burnished by time and assume the radiance of light. Dark columns stand within other areas of pale or muted colors to create a subtle interweaving of abstract forms.”
In the same essay, Johnson further contextualizes by linking the abstracts to ukiyo-e landscape traditions: “The Forest Byobu series becomes a vast panorama of the world of nature – its changing seasons, its colors, sounds, fragrances, shifting light and its endless complexities. These elaborate compositions project the artist’s imaginative and contemplative probing of abstract images through the enveloping regions of space and time. Multiple perspectives are guided by reflections and refractions of light as it illuminates objects or a universe as they move in uncharged orbits. The altering of forms and their reconstruction, their balances and imbalances and sudden break in a color sequence play over the supportive structures to create elements of change, surprise and mystery. They may suggest in intuitive terms a 20th century artist’s tribute to those elegant Views of Edo and the many lively views along the great Tokaido or Eastern Road leading from Tokyo that so enchanted Hokusai and Hiroshige in the earlier decades of the 19th century”
Five years earlier, Johnson had chosen this design, Light Mirror, Water Mirror, as one of the images featured on the cover of her seminal book, American Prints and Printmakers: A Chronicle of Over 400 Artists and Their Prints from 1900 to the Present, published in 1980 by Doubleday.
PROVENANCE:
Anju and Yoko Uchima Collection
REFERENCES:
Una Johnson, American Prints and Printmakers: A Chronicle of Over 400 Artists and Their Prints from 1900 to the Present, 1980, p. 228, no. 28 (two page spread), and cover illustration
Dulin Gallery of Art, 14th Dulin National Print and Drawing Exhibition, Knoxville, Tennessee, May 16 – June 22, 1980
Hunterdon Art Center, Reflections, Images (with Toshiko Uchima and Isamu Noguchi), Clinton, New Jersey, December 7 – January 18, 1981
Hanga Geijutsu, Summer 1982, Abe Publishing, p. 217
Una Johnson, Ansei Uchima: A Retrospective, Sarah Lawrence College, Bronxville, New York, April 2 – 28, 1985
Associated American Artists, Ansei Uchima Color Woodcuts, New York, September 7 – October 1, 1988
Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum, 69th Exhibition of the Japan Print Association, Tokyo, Japan, April 6 – 21, 2001
Worcester Museum of Art, object no. 2005.262
Okinawa Prefectural Museum and Art Museum, Ansei Uchima: Symphony of Colors and Wind, Naha, Japan, September 12 – November 8, 2014
Two Bodhisattvas and Ten Great Disciples of Sakyamuni: Bodhisattva Fugen (Samantabhadra) and Monju (Manjusri)
(Ni bosatsu shaka judai deshi: Fugen, Mongu)
Self-carved, self-printed (possibly early proofs); sumizuri-e, both with artist’s seal Muna, 1948
Fugen 40 1/2 by 15 7/8 in., 103 by 40.3 cm
Monju 40 3/8 by 15 7/8 in., 102.5 by 40.2 cm
Munakata Shiko was from Aomori, a coastal city in the northernmost prefecture of Japan’s main island Honshu. The third son of a blacksmith with boundless kinetic energy knew from an early age that he wanted to become an artist. In 1921, at the age of 18, he was deeply inspired by an image of a sunflower painting by Vincent Van Gogh in the literary magazine Shirakaba, resolving to focus his efforts on becoming a modern oil painter. Three years later he moved to Tokyo in September 1924 and began submitting paintings to the prestigious annual exhibitions of the Imperial Fine Arts Academy (known as Teiten) but was repeatedly rejected, four times. Around this time, he encountered a sumizuri-e (black and white) woodblock print by Sumio Kawakami (1895-1972) and was immediately struck by the starkness of the black and white and the artist’s ability to capture the mood of the poem that was its inspiration. Up until that moment, Munakata had been striving to emmulate his idol, Van Gogh, and his lavish use of color. But Munakata realized that the impressionist artists that he admired so much collected Japanese prints themselves, and that rather than pursue oil painting, a medium that was ultimately foreign, he was drawn to the singularly Japanese medium of woodblock printing. In 1928 he finally had a painting accepted at Teiten, and he met the highly-regarded print artist Unichi Hiratsuka (1895-1997), who was also from Munakata’s hometown of Aomori. Munakata picked up printing techniques from Hiratsuka, and the following year he had four prints accepted to an exhibition held by the Shunyo Kai art society. As he recounted, “I was fumbling with color prints…until one day I saw a woodcut but Sumio Kawakami. It was a black and white, a small work…suddenly I know I had found what I was looking for. Kawakami had shown me the way. I threw myself into prints.” (Yojuro Yasuda, 1958, p. 70)
From 1929 on, more exhibition successes and recognition followed, including his first one-man show at a Tokyo gallery and the publication of his first book of prints, Siza no Hanayome (Bride of the Constellation) in 1931. In 1936, Yanagi Soetsu (1889-1961), a founder of the mingei (folk craft) movement and the first Director of the Mingeikan (Japanese Folk Crafts Museum) noticed Munakata’s woodblock printed handscroll of twenty prints (ambitiously mounted horizontally), Yamato shi uruwashi Hanga Saku (Japan, The Beautiful) in an exhibition and approached Munakata to discuss purchasing the work for the new museum. Upon meeting this patron, Munakata immediately threw his arms around Yanagi; in his own words: “like a dog wagging it’s tail.” Munakata believed his real printmaking began at the moment of this sale to the museum, claiming “Mingei gave birth to me.” (Yasuda, pp. 72-74)
In 1939, Munakata acquired seven unusually large magnolia boards, the wood he preferred to use although it was difficult to obtain. In order to utilize as much of the material as possible, he produced a series of ten large-scale (each almost 1 meter high) woodblock prints which he titled, Shaka Judai Deshi (Ten Great Disciples of Shakyamuni). He was inspired by a visit to the Tokyo National Museum where he saw a statue of the Buddha’s disciple Subhuti. According to Munakata, he was not trying to represent the disciples literally, only to capture a range of expressions and later he named each figure as an afterthought. Munakata recalled, “it was with these prints…that I first became conscious of the full extent of the block, each of these figures touches the edge of the block at top, bottom and both sides” (Yasuda, p. 12). Munakata then supplemented the ten blocks with two bodhisattvas, Fugen (Samantabhadra, the boddhisattva of benevolence) and Monju (Manjusri, the bodhisattva of wisdom), in order to comprise a traditional set of twelve which could be presented on a pair of six-panel folding screens.
In 1940 the set won a prize at the Kokugakai (National Art Academy) Exhibition, and in the mid-1950s they took top prizes for printmaking at both the Sao Paulo (1955) and Venice (1956) Biennales. Miraculously, the original set of ten blocks survived the bombing of Tokyo during the war because Munakata used the large boards to line his air raid shelter, but the blocks for the two bodhisattvas were lost when his home was destroyed. In 1948 he carved new versions of Fugen and Monju, however, as there was a profound scarcity of materials in the post-war period (so much so that artists formed groups to work together to source supplies), it would have been very difficult to locate large boards. As such, in order to match the large scale of the survivng prints in the series, it is likely Munakata used two vertically aligned blocks, or even carved both sides of one block. These two prints are from the 1948 versions, which are noticeably different than the 1939 prints, with fuller faces and proportions that fill the compositions slightly more than the previous versions.
Munakata was never particularly concerned about limiting the production of his prints. To him, the creative process was initially in the carving, and then the printing brought the images to life. He did not hesitate to make changes to the blocks as he was printing, and he would continue to print an image as it suited him. It seems that the earliest printings of the series were not dated, but later impressions are dated as he produced them in 1950-60s. The horizontal pencil marks in the margins at the midway point on each sheet were likely made by Munakata to guide the registration as mainting the alignment would have been very challenging when working with separate blocks printing in different areas of one large sheet of paper, suggesting that both are very early impressions.
REFERENCES:
Yojuro Yasuda, ed., Oliver Statler (English text), Library of Japanese Art: Shiko Munakata, Charles E. Tuttle Co., 1958, p. 12, plates 9 & 10
Sherman Lee, Shiko Munakata: Catalogue of an Exhibition Sponsored by The Print Club of Cleveland and the Cleveland Museum of Art, January 5 – February 7, 1960, p. 14, no. 2 (Monju)
Yanagi Soetsu, Munakata’s Works, in, Munakata Shiko, Japanese Folk Crafts Museum and Ohara Museum of Art, Nishitoba Seihan Insatsujo, Japan, 1970 (introductory essay)
Joan S. Baker, Mokuhan: The Woodcuts of Munakata & Matsubara, Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, British Columbia, 1976, pp. 13-17 (introductory essay); pp. 102-108 (Munakata Chronology) The Complete Works of Shiko Munakata, Vol. 2, The World of the Gods (1), Kodansha, 1978, no. 80 (Fugen), no. 67 (Monju)
Oliver Statler, The Woodblock and the Artist: The Life and Work of Shiko Munakata, 1991, pp. 65-71 (1939 set with oringinal Fugen and Monju)
Jennifer Boynton and Kakeya Kiyoko, Munakata Shiko: Japanese Master of the Modern Print, Munakata Museum, Kamakura, Japan, 2002, p. 66-71 no. 5 (includes all prints from the series)
Art Institute of Chicago (artic.edu), reference no. 1963.645 (Monju, dated 1959, [erroneously identified as 1939 version])
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne (ngv.vic.gov.au), accession no. 1390A-5 (Fugen), no. P32-1969 (Monju)
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, (metmuseum.org), accession no. 2017.245.1 (Monju, dated 1960)
Self-carved, self-printed; titled, signed and dated on the bottom margin, FLIGHT: IN SPACE (PINK), ap (artist’s proof), A. Uchima, with artist’s circular monogram, AU, 1970
22 1/8 by 31 1/2 in., 56.2 by 80 cm
Uchima’s 1982 article, ‘My 30 Years Adventure With Woodblock Printing,’ which originally appeared in a 1982 issue of Hanga Geijutsu in Japanese, was published in English, translated by Laurence Bresler, in the catalogue of the retrospective exhibition, Ansei Uchima: Symphony of Colors and Wind, at the Okinawa Prefectural Museum and Art Museum in 2014. In that article, Uchima reflected on his work:
“Around 1965 the missionary role of abstract expressionism began to dissipate at the same time as many new movements began taking shape. In my own work the earlier proclivity to seek variety of form fortuitously began now to evolve toward a more conscious determination of distance and depth and the manipulation of space in the direction of the mysticism of surrealism. I still worked within a limited range of colors, but I began to introduce light based on the modulation of light and dark color harmony. I sought an enlargement of the pictorial surface through a clear discrimination of objects and space, the contrast between movement and stillness and a bold technique of shading off. Conceptualizing the play between expansion and contraction, I worked toward a geometric-like composition striving for a dynamic sense of tension. At this time, I became very interested again in straight line perspective and sought to implement the greatest possible potential inherent in its variation. The works which exhibit this trend include Flight, Space Landscape (C), and Flight in Space (Pink), and others (1970-71).”
PROVENANCE:
Anju and Yoko Uchima Collection
REFERENCES:
The Hudson River Museum, Invitational, Yonkers, New York, November 17, 1974 – January 19, 1975
Northern Illinois University, Eleven in Seventy-Seven: An International Exhibition of Eleven American Printmakers, DeKalb, Illinois, March 1 – 3, 1977 Hanga Geijutsu, Summer 1982, Abe Publishing, p. 216
Ansei Uchima, My Thirty-Years Adventure With Woodblock Printing, in, Ansei Uchima: Symphony of Colors and Wind, Okinawa Prefectural Museum and Art Museum, 2014, p. 139
Northern Illinois University Art Museum, object no. 1977.38
The Key by Tanizaki Junichiro: Portrait of Ikuko and Glasses on Her Belly
(Kagi hanga saku: Daisho no saku, Hara megane no saku)
sumizuri-e with artist’s red Muna seal at lower left margin, signed and dated in penciled kanji, Shiko, and penciled English, Munakata, 1958, with artist’s pine needle symbol, 1958
16 5/8 by 12 in., 42.2 by 30.5 cm
In 1956 the famous writer Tanizaki Jun’ichiro (1886-1965) asked his longtime friend Munakata to provide illustrations to accompany his forthcoming novel, Kagi (The Key), which was serialized in the literary magazine, Chuo koron. Munakata designed fifty-four prints that were produced in the order in which they appeared in the publication. The novel was a highly charged and somewhat dark exploration of relationships, presented as parallel diaries of a middle-aged husband and his younger wife, Ikuko, who he encourages to have an affair in order to stimulate his waning sexual desires.
The designs for the series captured the erotic tension of the novel, with cropped figures and fragmented scenes that complimented the dueling perspectives and passions of the husband and wife. This print is comprised of two of the most recognizable designs from the series, the suggestive nude of Ikuko in repose with Glasses on Her Belly, and the striking Ikuko okubi-e (‘big head’) portrait, returning our gaze which according to the Munakata museum inspired him to design many more (now highly sought-after) okubi-e portraits of beauties.
EXHIBITED:
James A. Michener Art Museum, Mid-Century to Manga: The Modern Japanese Print in America, Doylestown, Pennsylvania, March 4 – July 30, 2023
REFERENCES:
Japanese Folk Crafts Museum and Ohara Museum of Art, Munakata Shiko, Nishitoba Seihan Insatsujo, Japan, 1970, nos. 73, 75
Joan S. Baker, Mokuhan: The Woodcuts of Munakata & Matsubara, Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, British Columbia, 1976, no. 28 (a large head) The Complete Works of Shiko Munakata, Vol. 1, The World of Tales, Kodansha, 1978, no. 442 ( a large head), no. 436 (glasses on her belly)
Jennifer Boynton and Kakeya Kiyoko, Munakata Shiko: Japanese Master of the Modern Print, Munakata Museum, Kamakura, Japan, 2002, p. 107, no. 16 (and on series)
Art Institute of Chicago (artic.edu), reference no. 1961.115 (glasses on her belly)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, accession no. M.2000.108.4 (same format as this example with both designs printed on one sheet)
Self-carved, self-printed; signed in white at lower right, Kiyoshi Saito, titled, numbered and dated in pencil on bottom margin, NEW YORK (B) 19/50, 1963, with artist’s paper label attached to verso, self-carved, self-printed KIYOSHI SAITO, 1963
27 1/8 by 21 1/8 in., 69 x 53.5 cm
In January 1956 Saito was invited by the State Department to visit the United States, a trip which was extended an additional three months sponsored by the Asia Foundation. During the first half of his travels, Saito visited Seattle, Washington, D.C., New Orleans, Houston, Albuquerque, Santa Fe, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Denver, Chicago, Boston, New Work and Philadelphia, with a hectic schedule of exhibiting and teaching at various universities art departments and art museums. For the second three months he stayed for an extended period as an artist in residence at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor where the Asia Foundation was based. A subsequent trip to Mexico was cut short when Saito suffered a heat stroke, and his visit concluded back in Seattle at the home of George Tsutakawa, a professor of sculputre at the Univeristy of Washington who hosted Saito upon his initial arrival. In 1959 Saito visited France and Switzerland at the invitation of American businessman Cornelias Vander Starr (1892-1968), the founder of what would become the insurance giant AIG and whose namesake foundation has generously funded numerous grants worldwide including the C.V. Starr East Asian Library at Columbia University in New York, and a second located at the University of California at Berkely. Saito returned to states in 1962 and an exhibition of his work in New York was arranged by Starr at the Madison Avenue gallery owned by Lee Nordness, a leading force in promoting craft art in the United States. While Saito had lamented that his busy schedule during his first tour of the states did not allow sufficient opportunity for sketching, he was more careful during his later trips abroad and was able to produce woodblock prints upon his return to his studio in Japan, including this evocative view of the New York skyline.
REFERENCES:
Saito Kiyoshi Gagyo (Saito Kiyoshi’s Work), Abe Shuppan, 1990, p. 177, no. 247
Rhiannon Paget, Saito Kiyoshi: Graphic Awakening, The Ringling Museum of Art, 2021, pp. 8-11; p. 178 (on Saito’s travels)
Self-carved, self-printed; with paper watermark UCHIMA in lower left corner, titled, signed and dated in pencil on the bottom margin, Bridge, A.P. (artist’s proof), Toshiko Uchima 1965
24 by 17 3/4 in., 61 by 45 cm
In 1959, Toshiko, her husband Ansei (who was also a woodblock print artist), and their young son, Anju, left Japan and moved to the United States, settling the following year in New York City, where she lived until her death in 2000. In New York, she continued to produce prints until the mid-1960s. Perhaps in an effort not to conflict or overlap with Ansei’s carving and printing projects, Toshiko moved away from printmaking and focused her creative energies first on collages and later, in the 1970s, to box assemblages, frequently exhibiting her work in New York and Japan.
In her November 2020 lecture for the Japanese Art Society of America related to the group exhibition at Portland Art Museum, Joryu Hanga Kyokai, 1956-1965: Japan’s Women Printmakers, curator Dr. Jeannie Kenmotsu notes that this composition was likely inspired by the George Washington Bridge, a New York City landmark which would have been familiar to the Uchimas from their Upper West Side apartment on West 163rd Street, only steps from Riverside Park with the iconic span looming just 15 blocks uptown.
PROVENANCE:
Anju and Yoko Uchima Collection
REFERENCES:
Striped House Museum of Art, Ansei Uchima and Toshiko Uchima Two-Person Show, Tokyo, Japan, April 8 – 28, 1994
Portland Art Museum, Joryu Hanga Kyokai, 1956-1965: Japan’s Women Printmakers, September 24, 2020 – June 13, 2021
Dr. Jeannie Kenmotsu, Joryu Hanga Kyokai, 1956-1965: Japan’s Women Printmakers (lecture), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXaHNFejzzA&t=19s, November 19, 2020
Miyazaki Prefectural Art Museum, Miyazaki, Japan, accession no. P-756
Self-carved, self-printed; with paper watermark, Jun. Sekino, artist’s signature within the composition, Jun. Sekino, numbered, titled, signed, and dated in pencil on the bottom margin, a/p (artist’s proof), Nyuyoku, Jun. Sekino ’60, 1960
14 1/8 by 25 in., 36 x 63.5 cm
In 1958 Sekino was invited along with a group of arists and writers by the Rockefeller Foundation and the American Japan Society to visit the United States, travelling to New York where he taught at the Pratt Institute, located in Brooklyn. He returned again to the states in 1963 as a recipient of a Ford Foundation grant to teach woodblock printing at the University of Washington, Oregon State University, and the University of Oregon. He made a third visit to the United States in the summer of 1969 where he taught at Oregon State University, where his oldest son Junpei was a graduate student in mathematics.
This scarce view featuring the Chrysler Building and the newly-finished United Nations complex framed by sunflowers as seen from across the East River at Queensboro Park is one of five compositions the artist produced of the Manhattan skyline following his first trip to the states. There is another utilzing sunflowers, although the blossoms are positioned more prominently in contrast to the distant cityscape. He also captured the hustle and bustle of cars zipping around the ramps beneath the Brooklyn Bridge (cue the jazz music). The Museum of Modern Art saw fit to acquire the ominous New York and Graveyard (1959), one of two similar works depicting the skyline as seen from the Calvary Cemetary with a sea of headstones in the foreground mimicing the distant totems of skyscrapers, which they included in an exhibition 1968, Manhattan Observed, which included prints by a wide array of artists such as George Bellows, Paul Cadmus, Childe Hassam, David Hockney, Edward Hopper, Armin Landeck, Martin Lewis, Robert Rauschenberg, and Larry Rivers.
References:
Robert and Yoko McClain, Thirty-Six Portraits by Sekino Jun’ichiro, University of Oregon Museum of Art, Eugene, Oregon, 1977, pp. 6-8 (artist’s bio)
Usher P. Coolidge, Japanese Twentieth Century Prints from the Collection of C. Adrian Rubel, exh. cat., Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, 1966, cat. no. 41
Katsuko Sekino, Sekino Jun’ichiro hanga sakuhin shu (Jun-ichiro Sekino the Prints), 1997, p. 131, no. 260
William S. Lieberman, Manhattan Observed: Selections of Drawings and Prints, Museum of Modern Art, New York, March 22 – May 12, 1968, exh. cat., p. 36, (New York and Graveyard, alternate title, Graveyard in New York, ref. no. 670.65 [RP 674])
Harvard Art Museum, object no. 1974.102.59; titled Sunflowers and Skyscrapers (Flowers and New York)
Self-carved, self-printed; titled, numbered, signed and dated in pencil on the bottom margin, Winter Vista, Artist’s Proof, A. Uchima 1963
16 1/2 by 25 1/2 in., 41.9 by 64.8 cm
Uchima produced many prints in Tokyo in the mid-to late-1950s and participated in many important exhibitions, including at the Yoseido Gallery in Tokyo, the Sao Paulo International Biennale and the Grenchen International Print Triennial. Drawing upon his bi-cultural background, bilingual ability, and artistic experience, he served as a bridge between American collectors like Statler and James Michener (1907-1997), on the one hand, and the Japanese artists, on the other. In November 1959, he left Japan with his wife Toshiko, an artist, and their young son and settled in New York City in 1960, where he launched a new artistic career.
Uchima’s prints evolved from works influenced by Abstract Expressionism until the mid-1960s, to minimalist compositions using geometric shapes from the late 1960s to the mid-1970s and, from 1977 to the end of his career in 1982, to pastel-hued works with a ‘tapestried color surface’ and parallel vertical lines evoking the panels of a traditional Japanese folding screen, or byobu, which required great technical skill and labor, with up to 45 printings per sheet. In addition to woodcut prints, he produced etchings, oil and watercolor paintings and drawings in pastel, charcoal and pencil.
PROVENANCE:
Anju and Yoko Uchima Collection
REFERENCES:
Hitomi Oshiro, Ansei Uchima and His Life, in Ansei Uchima: Symphony of Colors and Wind, Okinawa Prefectural Museum and Art Museum, 2014, pp. 135-138 Ansei Uchima, Wikipedia.org Third Grenchen International Triennial of Original Colored Graphic Prints, Grenchen, Switzerland, June 13 – July 18, 1964
The White House Executive Wing, National Collection of Fine Arts Program, 1966
Okinawa Prefectural Museum and Art Museum, Ansei Uchima: Symphony of Colors and Wind, Naha, Japan, September 12 – November 9, 2014, p. 35, no. 25
Smithsonian American Art Museum, object no. 1965.25.19
Fleming Museum of Art, University of Vermont, object no. 1966.5
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, accession no. 66.536.2
Syracuse University Art Museum, object no. 1966.0093
Mead Art Museum, Amherst College, accession no. AC 1994.690
Large woodblock print signed within the composition in white ink, Kiyoshi Saito, titled, numbered and dated in pencil on the bottom margin, PANSY 53/100 1964, with artist’s printed slip attached to verso, ‘self-carved, self printed KIYOSHI SAITO, 1964
23 5/8 by 17 3/4 in., 60 by 45 cm
REFERENCES:
Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, object no. 1966.081.001
The Cleveland Museum of Art, accession no. 1985.517
Souvenirs of Travel, Third Series: Kinosaki, Tajima
(Tabi miyage dai sanshu: Tajima, Kinosaki)
Signed in blue ink Hasui, with red circular seal Kawase, publisher’s rectangular (Hotei ‘B’) seal on lower right margin, Hanken shoyu Watanabe Shozaburo (Copyright ownership Watanabe Shozaburo), the print title on the left margin, Tajima Kinosaki, followed by the date, Taisho jusannen saku (made in Taisho 13 [1924])
Oban yoko-e 10 1/4 by 151 5/8 in., 26 by 385 cm
A nocturnal streetscape in the rain of a narrow street beside a canal; on either side are low buildings (spa inns) and tall electric poles. The palette is extremely dark, aside from areas of blue in the water, the yellow umbrella of a pedestrian, and the warm orange-yellow of the lit windows, all else is rendered in black and shades of grey. In the distance, the shape of a mountain is barely visible against the dark sky; lighter areas of mist settle on the lower hills.
The Great Kanto Earthquake of the previous year marked a turning point for shin-hanga. Watanabe of course recovered (his previous employer and competitor, Kobayashi Bunshichi did not), but with limited resources to get back on his feet, Watanabe must have, to a certain extent, focused production on works which would be commercially viable. In the coming years, he and Hasui increasingly refined their idyllic views, with fewer touches of the modern world, such as the electric poles in this print. Likewise there are fewer examples of experimental creative expression, such as this highly unusual and dramatic rendering of rain in black ink.
References:
Kato, Junzo, comp., Kindai Nihon hanga taikei, 1975-76, Vol. 3, pl. 21
Narazaki Muneshige, Kawase Hasui mokuhanga shu, 1979, pl. 121
Irwin J. Pachter, Kawase Hasui and His Contemporaries, 1986, p. 51, pl. 33
Kendall H. Brown and Goodall-Cristante, Hollis, Shin Hanga: New Prints in Modern Japan, 1996, p. 19, fig. 4
Kendall H. Brown, Kawase Hasui: The Complete Woodblock Prints, 2003, p 341, pl. 121
Abe Publishing, Kawase Hasui Woodblock Prints, 2009, p. 44, no. 58
Chiba City Museum of Art, Kawase Hasui, 2013, p. 77, no. 71
Folk Museum of Ota City, Hasui Kawase, 2013, p. 41, no. 39 (with three related pencil sketches)
Carolyn M. Putney, Fresh Impressions: Early Modern Japanese Prints, Toledo Museum of Art, 2013, p. 131, cat. no. 74
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, accession no. 49.689
The Art Institute of Chicago, reference no. 1990.607.441
Signed Hasui with artist’s seal Kawase, with publisher’s seal (Hotei ‘D’, ca. 1929-42) on lower right margin, Hanken shoyu Watabanbe Shozaburo (Copyright ownership Watanabe Shozaburo), the title on the left margin, Ikegami Honmon-ji, followed by the date Showa rokunen ichigatsu saku (made in Showa 6 [1931], January), 1931
Oban tate-e 15 3/8 by 10 3/8 in., 38.9 by 26.2 cm
Blair records that this print required 20 color blocks, 25 impressions or pulls from the blocks (“superimposed printings”), for an initial edition of 300 prints.
PROVENANCE:
Neil Charles Stipanich (Alamo, California, 1948-2019)
REFERENCES:
Dorothy Blair, Modern Japanese Prints, The Toledo Museum of Art, 1936, no. 28
Narazaki Muneshige, Kawase Hasui mokuhanga shu, 1979, p. 107, no. 320
Kendall H. Brown, Kawase Hasui: The Complete Woodblock Prints, 2003, p. 413, no. 245
Kendall H. Brown, Visions of Japan: Kawase Hasui’s Masterpieces, 2004, p. 78, no. 42
Folk Museum of Ota City, Hasui Kawase, 2007, p. 40, no. 67
Hisao Shimizu, Kawase Hasui, Folk Museum of Ota City, 2013, pp. 120-121, no. 151 (illustrated with pencil drawing from artist’s sketchbook)
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, John Stewart Happer Collection, accession no. 1949.400
The Art Institute of Chicago, reference no. 1961.216
Spring Snow (Kiyomizu Temple, Kyoto) (Haru no yuki [Kyoto Kiyomizu])
Signed Hasui with artist’s seal Kawase, the title on the right margin, Haru no yuki (Kyoto Kiyomizu), followed by the date, Showa shichinen shigatsu (made in Showa 7 [1932], April), with publisher’s 12 mm round ‘Do’ watermark in upper left corner and early post-war combination of in-line seals (ca. 1948-50), Hanken shoyu Doi Hangaten (Copyright reserved Doi Hangaten), followed by seals, suri (printer) Ito, and hori (carver) Katsumura, 1932
Oban tate-e 15 7/8 by 10 3/4 in., 40.4 by 27.2 cm
Unlike the skilled artisans who produced prints for Watanabe Shozaburo’s publishing house, the carvers and printers working for Doi were credited for their work on with their seals, which were impressed on individual woodblock prints. This print bears the carver seal of Katsumura Shozo, who Merritt notes was “one of the most highly respected carvers of Taisho and prewar Showa times, said to have been able to split one hair into three pieces” (Merritt, p. 39).
PROVENANCE:
Neil Charles Stipanich (Alamo, California, 1948-2019)
REFERENCES:
Narazaki Muneshige, Kawase Hasui mokuhanga shu, 1979, p. 210, no. D-8
Kendall H. Brown, Kawase Hasui: The Complete Woodblock Prints, 2003, p. 429, no. 276
Helen Merritt, Modern Japanese Woodblock Prints: The Early Years, 1990, p. 39 (on Katsumura Shozo)
Hisao Shimizu, Hasui Kawase, Folk Museum of Ota City, 2007, p. 46, no. 90
Hisao Shimizu, Kawase Hasui, Folk Museum of Ota City, 2013, p. 139, no. 184
Chris Uhlenbeck, Amy Reigle Newland and Maureen de Vries, Waves of Renewal: Modern Japanese Prints, 1900-1960, Selection from the Nihon no hanga Collection, 2016, p. 18, fig. 8
Chazen Museum of Art, John H. Van Vleck Collection, accession no. 1980.769
The Art Institute of Chicago, reference no. 1990.607.637
Harvard Art Museums, Arthur M. Sackler Museum, accession no. 1978.265
Honolulu Museum of Art, James A. Michener Collection, object no. 19209
Creative Connections: Sosaku-Hanga Artists & New York
December 5, 2024 – February 14, 2025
We are pleased to present for our Winter 2024–2025 gallery exhibition a collection of woodblock prints by a group of preeminent Japanese sosaku-hanga artists. The show includes self-carved and self-printed works by Shiko Munakata (1903–1975), Jun’ichiro Sekino (1914–1988), Kiyoshi Saito (1907–1997), Toshi Yoshida (1911–1995), and his younger brother, Hodaka Yoshida (1924–2017), along with Hodaka’s wife, Chizuko Yoshida (1924–2017), as well as another set of spouses, Ansei Uchima (1921–2000) and his wife, Toshiko Uchima (1918–2000). The unifying theme of this exhibition is the vital role of each of these artists in “bringing” sosaku hanga to the United States and, in particular, New York. Exposing this uniquely Japanese art form to wider audiences, some created important works during their time in New York, others demonstrated and provided instructions on their techniques and approaches to art in American educational institutions. All selected artists participated in significant exhibitions of their work in New York and elsewhere in the States.
The sosaku hanga movement came to the forefront of Japan’s artistic world in the 1950s, with some of its leading practitioners, including Munakata and Saito, winning widespread recognition through prestigious international awards and with enthusiastic American collectors such as Oliver Statler (1915–2002) and James A. Michener (1907–1997) spreading awareness and appreciation to an ever-growing audience. It was an exciting time for the artists of this movement, who were part of a close community centered in Tokyo, frequently socializing, exchanging ideas, inspiring and educating one another, as well as interacting with artists working in other media, who were enjoying their own creative explorations in other vibrant movements of the time.
We are pleased to announce the release of the second pair of designs in Binnie’s two concurrent series which launched earlier this year; Rabbit from the Japanese Zodiac series, and Tan Lines from A Day at the Beach series.
Japanese Zodiac: Rabbit features a model with tattoos that represent the Year of the Rabbit (which in the zodiac calendar precedes the dragon, featured in the first print in the series). The upper tattoo is derived from an Utagawa Kuniyoshi (1797-1861) print of a toy rabbit ferrying a boat, originally printed as an aka-e (red picture), produced as a lucky talisman to ward off smallpox in the 19th century. Children’s toys were popular subjects of these prints, as were images of Shoki the Demon-Queller, as illness was often framed as the work of demons. The lower tattoo is inspired by the 1889 print by Tsukioka Yoshitoshi (1839-1892) illustrating the Jade Rabbit and the Monkey King before a large pink moon from the One Hundred Aspects of the Moon series. Binnie has added a touch of humor in the placement of the moon in this composition, which alludes to the play on words with the English phrase ‘mooning.’
In A Day at the Beach: Tan Lines, the figure was printed using the same block set to create Rabbit from Binnie’s Japanese Zodiac series. In this non-tattoo version, the figure is printed to show two levels of tan lines, from longer shorts and from a speedo worn at different times, leaving paler areas untanned. The background is reduction printed in approximately 19 colors, and an embellishment of mica has been used to suggest the wet sand at the water’s edge.
To view these works and more by Binnie, click here.
RECENT ASIA WEEK NEW YORK AUTUMN 2024 EXHIBITION
TREASURED VIEWS:
The Stipanich Collection of Kawase Hasui Woodblock Prints
September 12 – 20, 2024
11am – 5pm during duration of the exhibit (including 14-15 weekend), appointments appreciated; otherwise by appointment through October 4
We are pleased to be exhibiting Treasured Views: The Stipanich Collection of Kawase Hasui Woodblock Prints, a choice group of landscape prints by the 20th century shin-hanga master. The collection was assembled by Neil and Nancy Stipanich, who as a young married couple in the mid-1970s lived in Jakarta, Indonesia, and traveled extensively in Asia during their time abroad. In 1976 they spent 3 weeks in Japan- even climbing Mount Fuji to see the sunrise. The 1976 adventure sparked a love of Japanese art that continued throughout their lives together. These landscape woodblock prints by Kawase Hasui were a particular passion of Neil’s, and after his sudden passing, his family have decided to release them into the world for new collectors to treasure.
We are constantly updating our inventory with new prints. To browse for works by artist, or search by title, series or keyword, visit our Recent Additions here.
ONLINE EXHIBITIONS
COLLECTING THE MASTER:
The Binnie Collection of Hiroshi Yoshida Paintings
This presentation is the culmination of decades-long pursuit of assembling a comprehensive representation of paintings by the great 20th century Japanese artist, Hiroshi Yoshida (1876-1950), collected by the prominent woodblock print artist, Paul Binnie (b. 1967). Binnie began to build a collection of Yoshida woodblock prints and original paintings and drawings around 1989, when he purchased his first landscape print by the earlier master. Over time, Binnie was able to assemble almost every woodblock print that Yoshida made, numbering over 250 designs. An academically trained painter himself, Binnie was keen to collect oil paintings, scroll paintings, watercolors and drawings, often with a connection to woodblock prints, as his fascination was with Yoshida as both painter and printmaker. In addition to the scrolls and fan paintings, The Binnie Collection of Hiroshi Yoshida Paintings offers two drawings, four watercolors and eight oil paintings, including the original canvases for three of Yoshida’s woodblock prints, Breithorn, Ghats at Benares and New York.
Paul Binnie: 30 Prints for 30 Years of Printmaking
In 1993, Paul Binnie (b. 1967) moved from Paris to Tokyo in order to pursue training as a woodblock carver and printer, embarking on an artistic career that established him as one of the most important artists working in the Japanese tradition of woodblock printmaking. Now, thirty years hence, Binnie is still going strong. This month he released the tenth design in his series, Flowers of A Hundred Years (Bubble Era [of 1990]), as well as a limited edition set of three woodblock printed illustrations commissioned for a deluxe edition the science fiction classic novel, The Moon Moth. In recognition and celebration of Paul Binnie’s 30 years as a printmaker, Scholten Japanese Art has assembled a very special online exhibition of some of the artist’s most rare and sought-after works including such rarities as his 1994 Nocturne, the 2005 Butterfly Bow, and the 2006 Phoenix Dream, all of which have long proven (nearly) impossible to acquire by his most ardent collectors.
To view these works and others in the exhibition, click here.
Meiji Period (1868-1912)
An online presentation of Meiji Period (1868-1912) woodblock prints in celebration of the Japanese Art Society of America’s 50th anniversary exhibition, Meiji Modern: Fifty Years of New Japan, opening on October 3, 2023 at the Asia Society here in New York.
Our selection includes works by Kiyochika, Yoshitoshi, Ginko, Kunichika, Chikanobu, and Shuntei, among others, and concludes with a group of fifteen prints from the collaborative series promoting modern goods, Collections of Famous Products, The Pride of Tokyo, featuring complex mitate (parodies) enriched by layered meanings and cultural references which are revealed by unlocking the rebuses (picture puzzles) and wordplay.
View the exhibition here.
View the exhibition index here.
Backstage Pass: KABUKI (Part One and Two)
Featuring a selection of shin hanga prints and related ephemera, this online exhibit offers viewers both a front row seat to the drama…as well as a peek behind the curtain.
View Part One of the exhibition here.
View Part Two of the exhibition here.
About the Gallery
Scholten Japanese Art is a private gallery specializing in Japanese woodblock prints and paintings. We offer ukiyo-e from the 18th to 20th centuries, including shin hanga, sosaku hanga, and Japanese-style woodblock prints produced by Western artists. Located in a spacious suite in the old Meurice Hotel, just steps from Central Park South, we enjoy meeting with visitors one on one in order to best learn about your interests and share the collection with you.
We opened its doors September 2000 in a renovated townhouse on New York’s Upper East Side. In May of 2003, Scholten moved to a private suite in the old Meurice Hotel located on 58th Street between Sixth and Seventh Avenues. We initially planned to stay in midtown temporarily, however, we were pleasantly surprised to find the central location in the heart of Manhattan offers advantages in accessibility for both local collectors (who frequently have business in the area) and proximity to numerous hotels for out-of-town visitors. In 2009 we decided to expand to a larger space in the same building which was renovated to provide more exhibition space as well as a separate ‘Print Room’ devoted to our library and large inventory of woodblock prints. We organize at least two public exhibitions every year during Asia Week (both March and September), but we always have a selection of prints and paintings on view throughout the year.
