Swallows in flight 1900 - 1930

Ohara Koson made this woodblock print of swallows in flight, probably sometime in the early 20th century. The colour palette is muted; the marks are soft and suggest constant motion. I'm really drawn to the way Koson uses the texture of the paper itself. The whole background has this lovely, granular feel which brings an unexpected dimension to the print. And it works beautifully with the birds, too. The blurred lines of their wings suggests that they are moving through the air at speed. The artist is not trying to capture a perfect likeness of these birds, but to show them as fleeting impressions. Thinking about Koson's other prints of birds and flowers, it seems that he never stops experimenting with form and trying to push his technique further, like Hokusai, maybe. Art is an ongoing conversation and there are no definitive answers, just a constant process of learning and discovery.