Peonies 1929

Inuzuka Taisui made this print, Peonies, with color woodcut, sometime around 1920. The peonies float in a blue vase patterned with graphic red shapes, all set against a rough black background. I like how Taisui used the wood’s grain to create the background. It’s a field of dots! I can imagine the artist carefully carving the wood blocks to create the image, and the concentration it would have taken to get the shapes of the flowers just right. It makes me think about what it would have been like to print this image: choosing the colors, applying them to the wood, and then carefully pressing the paper onto the block, transferring the image. There’s something so amazing about the hands-on process, the directness of the medium. Each color laid down separately! Layers upon layers! Each print, a conversation between artist, material, and process. It’s a kind of thinking through making, where the act of creation itself reveals new possibilities and understandings, as well as echoes of Japanese woodblock prints of the past.