Although people on the consumer side of the 'producer/consumer' divide don't want to hear anything about this just yet, those of us who make things - especially things that are frequently selected as gifts - are busy getting ready for the upcoming 'gift season' ...

For me at this time of year, this means printing up more copies of the collection of small prints I show on my Gift Print page every year, and also preparing a new one to join them. 'New' in this case meaning new to that page, as I usually pull some blocks out of my storeroom for this.

The new print going onto the page this year will be the Daruma design I created some years back:

Filling in the second eye of a Daruma doll is of course done when one's project comes to a successful conclusion, so I think this is an obvious choice for this year! :-)

So we got the blocks out today and began to get ready for printing. But as our gift prints all have to fit quite tightly in their packaging in order to fit an air mail envelope, we're going to print these with a smaller margin than I did when originally issuing this print many years ago. So that means that the registration marks on all the blocks have to be moved 'in', towards the design areas. That was young Ayumi-san's work yesterday ...

She cut small plugs of wood, inserted them into the block in the original registration corners, and then cut new notches in the appropriate place:

Teiko-san will be here tomorrow, and her job will be to run the first test batch. Once we've confirmed everything is OK, we'll get busy running off the main batch for the Gift Page ...

... if, that is, Mother Nature permits ...

Posted by Dave Bull at 10:28 PM | Comments (0)

The penultimate impression is the one that for most of the prints in this series, is the final one - the karazuri embossed border:

But this image has one more. Before I can 'print' it I have to dry the paper. Once that is done, I then take the stack of prints and place them face up in front of the block.

They are of course usually face down, ready for the front surface of the paper to be pressed into the pigment. But this block will use no pigment - this will be a sho-men-zuri (front rubbing impression). The block is carved in mirror image (heh!) of its usual orientation ...

... and a quick pass of the baren across the front of the sheet gives the paper in that area a nice shiny finish.

The publisher of the original book had no time for such fooling around, but hey, our aim is but to please you!

Posted by Dave Bull at 7:22 PM | Comments (2)

We continue to fill in secondary areas that add richness to the print. Next up is the background in the mirror:

And with all the colours for the figure now done, it's time to put the main background in place - just a very faint blue/grey tone on the paper:

And then the outlines and title:

We now have two impressions left, but I won't be able to do those today. I have been sidetracked for a short trip to Utsunomiya, where a civic group is holding a week-long event to promote their connection with the origins of the famous 'Hyakunin Isshu' poetry series, and I am displaying my own set of those prints there. I'll be out of here for a couple of days to get that setup and running ...

But helper-lady Yasui-san has been working on the mounting boards and story sheet for this print, so as soon as I get back and do those final impressions, we'll be sending this one on its way to the waiting (and very patient!) collectors ...

Posted by Dave Bull at 7:59 AM | Comments (0)

After the 'main event' feeling of getting the kimono tone in place, the next few impressions add some of the supporting cast. I'm adding another block to some of the hair ornaments. In the original, these are all done with a single block, but I think they need a bit of variety:

After six impressions, are we nearly done? Halfway, actually!

Next is a contrasting tone for one of the lower parts of her kimono. I thought at first this was the obi sash, but it's actually another section of the main kimono design:

And the background colour for the title cartouche goes in next, even though the outlines of the box are not yet done.

It's a tiny bit dangerous doing it this way, because I'm trusting that my cutting is in accurate registration, but I like to have the lettering going on last if possible, so that it has a bit of relief against the flat colour ...

Posted by Dave Bull at 11:41 PM | Comments (1)

A very long and full day of printing today, and lots to show you!

First up is the pale vermillion tone on her under kimono. The pigment has a touch of sumi mixed into it, to bring the 'brightness' down to a level that will match the kimono that will surround it later:

Now, before I show you the next stages of the print, I'd like to put up an image of one of the test sheets I did last week. This is a proof sheet showing the raw purple colour that I will use for her outer kimono. Note that in this case, it is printed right on the bare paper, with no undertone. The colour you see here is basically what is in my pigment bowl:

And here we have exactly the same colour, printed in a light impression onto the print itself. Hard to believe it's the same stuff, but it is ...

Now that's not a bad colour, but this is now where we will be leaving it. Once I got to the end of the stack of 120 sheets, I flipped it over and started again at the beginning, with the same pigment and the same block, doing a second impression of the same thing. And this will be the final tone for her kimono, quite similar to the colour known as 'Kodai Murasaki' (Ancient Purple):

Posted by Dave Bull at 10:45 PM | Comments (2)

Here is a dub of the recent NHK program in the Journeys in Japan series - the visit to the Shirakami Sanchi forest area ...

(It'll take a few seconds to start streaming after you click 'Play' ...)

Posted by Dave Bull at 8:48 AM | Comments (2)

So here we go ... the blocks are all done; time to get printing!

Because there are is a fair amount of detail in this image - hair, etc. - it is important for me to get the paper into 'good' condition, so before beginning the printing with pigments, I gave it an impression on a blank woodblock. This left the paper (in the central area only) with a nice smooth surface, and also helped me get the moisture to the proper 'soft' level. Once the paper had recovered, I began the main printing, starting of course with the key block:

At the end of that day, I then took the stack out from its moistening sheets, and dried them all off completely. I did this because if I simply pressed ahead with the colour printing in the usual way there would be a lot of 'transfer' of these black lines. Key block printing is normally done with a not-so-dense black pigment and very little paste, giving a result that doesn't usually transfer while printing colours, but in this case, in order to get her hair to a nice dense level, I had to use a pretty rich mix (along with plenty of paste) and that is a perfect recipe for transfer.

Drying the sheets and letting them sit for a day or so before re-wetting helps obviate most of the transfer, and early this morning, I was able to continue with the printing, beginning with an under-tone for the main kimono:

Most of this will be covered up by subsequent tones ...

Posted by Dave Bull at 10:52 PM | Comments (3)

And ... the colour blocks are all done! With no particularly complex patterns on this design, these blocks are mostly simple 'flat' areas, and it was all done in the course of a (fairly long) day on Thursday.

Here they are, in the same orientation we saw in the previous post:

The flip sides:

When I begin test proofing in a couple of days, I'm going to be fairly 'free' with the colouring. The sample image I have been working from is a Taisho era reproduction of the original Harunobu book (thank you Jacques!), and some of the colouring is a bit 'hard' (to my taste). But the colouring of the original version isn't all that attractive either, so I'm going to give myself a free hand to create something pleasant, and which is hopefully reminiscent of the original era.

If you study those colour blocks in any detail, you will see that I have cut them to allow quite a bit of colour buildup - some areas of her kimono are on three overlapping blocks. I love doing the colouring this way, as it results in colour tones that are much richer than those created with a single impression, even if that be mixed to produce exactly the same tint in the end result.

Posted by Dave Bull at 8:51 PM | Comments (1)

The colour separation work is now done, and it looks as though we'll be able to keep it on four pieces of wood (using both sides, of course):

And here they are, all pasted down:

Flip them over ...

Posted by Dave Bull at 8:14 AM | Comments (2)

Although this past week too has been filled with 'interruptions' from the Ukiyoe Heroes project fulfillment work (thank heavens for phpMyAdmin!), I managed to do a lot of carving too, and I got the keyblock finished last night:

Here are a couple of closeups:

I have written before I think about a kind of paradox involved with carving delicate hair like this. I am making a reproduction of an older print, but the man who carved that original print was working from a designer's sketch. Because the old carvers were so skilled, it was not necessary (nor practical) for the designer to draw hairs one-by-one; he would just use a light grey wash to indicate the area where hair would appear. The carver would then work 'freehand' along the area, cutting a row of hairs.

Skilled men would do a very neat job, but even so, they weren't robots, and when you look at the result in extreme closeup, you can see slight variations in thickness, placement, etc.

Move ahead to the present, and my problem is that I am attempting to reproduce the print exactly. I don't have the freedom to work 'freehand', but must attempt to copy the first carver's work, variations and all. But of course I am also not a robot, so my own variations get introduced as I go along.

If I am not careful, we end up being in a situation where there is a degradation in quality as we move 'down the steps', further and further away from the designer's sketch. I try to limit this by giving myself the freedom to 'fix' the first carver's work as I move along. If I see that one of his hairs is a bit too fat, I will slim it down; if one of them is placed just a tad to one side, I will shift it back. But of course as I am doing so, I am constantly introducing my own variations as I go.

So no matter how good I get at this, and how carefully I do my job, a very close comparison of my print and the one I am reproducing will always show differences. The print I am making here is clearly an adaptation (I have selected just a portion of the original), but when I am making a full-scale reproduction of a famous work, it should always be possible for a determined viewer to find differences between mine and the original.

Posted by Dave Bull at 6:31 AM | Comments (2)

I posted a couple of months back that I had been approached by an NHK producer about doing another program for them, and here we are - it is now scheduled for (global) broadcast, on cable channels around the world, and on the internet. Broadcast will be next Monday/Tuesday the 10th/11th, and the internet version will be repeated six times at approximately 4-hour intervals, to accommodate people in different time zones.

Their information page on the program - Journeys in Japan - is here, and the page with scheduling information is here. (There are menus on that schedule page to select the date and your own time zone.)

If you will be watching the program on the net, it will be visible on the player located on the NHK World front page (select the 512K option for a larger view ...).

Printmaking content? None! This is a travel program, and I will be your host, introducing you to the Shirakami Sanchi forest area ...

While we were driving back towards the airport to return to Tokyo, the producer asked me to write a 'few words' sometime later for use on the program web page. I had my laptop with me though, and nothing else to do at the moment, so tapped it out and handed it over for her to read. She gave the OK ...

During the course of making this episode of Journeys in Japan, I was taken by a guide into the deep recesses of the beech forest, where we walked side by side among the old trees. I felt the rain on my upturned face, I saw how this water nourished the new soil that was being created from the fallen beech leaves by the action of many insects and small creatures, and I immersed my body in the fresh mountain stream.

I learned through my skin - through the contact with the rain, the soil, and the river - that I too am a living part of this process. When we came down from the mountains and saw the endless vista of rice paddies flourishing under the hot sun, we understood where their nourishment came from. And still further along our journey, out on the wide surface of the Sea of Japan, we saw that even there - far removed from the outstretched branches of the beech trees catching the rain - their effect was still being felt. The fish we ate that day had been nourished directly by the nutrients supplied by that forest.

And I - the big pink monkey who was your travel companion for this program - this animal drank the forest, ate it, swam in it, slept in it, and thus now directly understands in his bones the importance of such things. I hope that I and the program producers have helped the viewers understand what a wonderful place this is, and how important it is to preserve, protect and maintain it.

Thank you for coming along on this Journey. I hope you have enjoyed it!

Posted by Dave Bull at 9:39 AM | Comments (5)

Look at this - more than a month since I brought you an 'Arts of Japan' update! What have I been doing ... taking time off?

(heh-heh ...)

Well, taking 'time off' is not exactly a good description of what I have been doing for the past month, but yes, I admit that I have not been 'faithful' to this print series during August!

But starting today, I'm back at it, and - as always - the first step is to get the tracing for the carving ready:

No prizes for those who recognize the artist on this one, but I suspect there is only one reader of this blog who can identify the actual image itself ...

Posted by Dave Bull at 8:34 PM | Comments (5)