Saturday, February 23, 2008


god bless google books: information from long out of prints on the shin & sosaku hanga movements (creative print movement) on both father and son Hide & Yuzaburo Kawanishi.

Their prints have long facinated me, I have a Yuzaburo of Kobe bay in the 1960s - that belonged to my grandfather - given to him by the artist himself. i have long wanted a Hide of Kobe bay to match it.

for those not not familliar with the pairs work they are charachterised by bold vibrant colours with a distinct lack of black outlines - typical of the classical Ukio-e movements that had come earlier (and distinctive to traditional japanese prints)

the distinction between shin hanga and sosaku hanga - is this the litteral differance that all the work was created by one artist - the blocks, the inking and the printing in the case of shin, in the case of sosaku all the processes were done by different artists/craftsmen.

what facinates me about the movement is the pure use of colour - whimsical yet serious

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