Vliegende kwartel 1900 - 1930

Ohara Koson made this woodblock print of a flying quail, sometime between 1900 and 1936. There’s something about the process of woodblock printing that lends itself to crisp lines and flat planes of color, and Koson uses that to his advantage here. You get a sense of the texture of the bird's feathers, not through shading, but through the accumulation of tiny marks. The overall effect is both precise and dreamy. Look at how the artist captures the arc of the tall grass. It's like a single breath, a perfectly controlled gesture. It makes me think about the connection between art and nature. How artists don't just copy what they see, but transform it through their own vision and process. Think of Hiroshige, another Japanese printmaker, who also found endless inspiration in the natural world. Ultimately, art is an ongoing conversation, each artist adding their voice to the mix.