Winter 1959

Ansei Uchima made this black and white print, called Winter, sometime during his career. I look at this image and feel the artist searching—in the upper part of the composition, he is slashing and testing out marks. I can imagine him thinking, how will I distill the essence of winter using only black and white? What mark can convey the mood and feeling of the cold season? I see a confident spiral that feels sure of itself, contrasting with more searching gestures. What a strange yet satisfying composition—the large black shape on the left anchors the piece. It makes me think of artists like Joan Miró who were also using a symbolic visual language. Uchima’s work reminds us that artists look at each other's work and have an ongoing conversation across time. It's about different ways of seeing, thinking, and feeling the world through painting and printmaking.