There are still some professional carvers and printers thriving in Japan, however, whose mission is to keep historic methods alive through the recreation of early prints, and through public demonstrations of historic processes. Like sosaku hanga artists, generally speaking, moku hanga artists (people like myself) design, carve and print their own works. Moku Hanga – Meaning ‘wood print’, moku hanga is the contemporary Japanese word used to describe the water-based method of Japanese woodblock printmaking made today. By the turn of the 20th century, ukiyo-e started to become hugely popular outside of Japan, especially among the French Impressionists, even as its popularity inside Japan began to wane.įrom Winter in Aizu, Kiyoshi Saitō, woodblock print ( sosaku hanga) 1967 Ukiyo-e imagery includes women, actors, historical scenes, landscapes, flora and fauna, and erotica. Ukiyo-e – Known as the golden age of Japanese woodblock prints, the design, carving and printing were tasks performed by separate highly skilled artists/craftsmen. So here are a few brief explanations of the different eras of Japanese woodblock prints, how the art has evolved from the 17th century to present day, and how this fertile history has influenced my own creative process and way of thinking. Yet, words and historical context can give the viewer a richer understanding. What’s important is how art makes you feel.
The meaning of Japanese woodblock print terms And most significant for artists, are the markedly different handling experiences between the two. With oil, the pigments are much weightier. With watercolor, the colors become luminous through their transparency – the light of the paper shines through the colors. The two processes simply have different aesthetics. In sum, because water and oil based inks have such different looks (and behaviors), the contrast between Japanese and Western processes may be compared to the distinction between watercolor and oil painting.
Mostly referred to as ‘woodcut’, attention in the West is typically focused on the drawing-like cut lines in the wood – versus the flat, shadowless shapes of layered colors in the Japanese approach. In Europe, this medium was developed to an extraordinary degree during the Renaissance (notably, German artist Albrecht Dürer). The image from the carved block may be transferred to the paper by pressures as varied as rubbing the back of the paper with a wooden spoon to using a mechanical press. Unlike Japanese techniques, Western methods utilize viscose, tacky inks (historically oil based) applied to blocks with rubber-like rollers, called brayers.
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