Woodblock RoundTable

Auction results

For those of you who have been holding your breath waiting to see if the latest auction pickings are junk or treasure, I can report positively ... (again!)

There were indeed two 'hon' barens in the lot:

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More Auctioneeering!

Do you remember the excitement around here back in March, when we spotted an auction for a box of old tools?

Well it's time for Round Two! We've turned up another 'interesting' one. Here's the main photo from the auction listing:

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New Encyclopedia entry ...

This is an update not many people will have been expecting just now, what with all the actual printmaking activity going on here these days, but if you saw the blog post on the Mokuhankan Conversations about the auction 'Treasure Box' a couple of weeks ago, you might remember that we found a whole bunch of beautiful woodblock prints tucked into one of the boxes.

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In 'my' garden ...

My own property here extends nothing more than a few feet out from all sides of the building, but I do have a huge 'backyard', courtesy of my neighbour Tamura-san across the river.

A few years back, he took a chain saw to a very large cherry tree that I could see from my workshop window, but over at the other end of his property, he has another one:

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Travelling in old Japan ...

Collector and friend Serge Astieres sent along a link this morning - to a new web site that he has just completed. It's 'La route du Kisodaido' (I don't think you need a translation ...)

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Treasure Chest

Those of you who have been following the Mokuhankan Conversations blog know that I recently participated in an auction for a box of old tools. The lead-up to the auction - and its aftermath - are the content of my newest video, which features some 'Candid Camera' of two of our printer trainees as they discover the treasures we obtained ...

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Arts of Japan series : print #5 - final steps

Look at that ... after finishing the print, and getting it into the drying boards, I got so involved with the next work that I forgot to update this RoundTable with the final series of images.

Here they are ... The next impression was one of the easiest ones on the whole design - a cascade of embers coming off the fire basket:

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Arts of Japan series : print #5 - printing steps 9~11

Another good day of work on this print. Getting a very early start (before the other printers get here) helps a lot!

First today was the wide, faint gradation on the water ... dissolving to nothing over at the left side of the paper:

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Arts of Japan series : print #5 - printing steps 6~8

Well, look at that ... I did manage to get three colours done today too!

First was another grey tone - this one deepens various places, and transforms the colour of the main character's shirt:

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Arts of Japan series : print #5 - printing steps 3~5

Here are the next three impressions on the print.

The main group of actors makes their entrance, although of course not in finished form yet:

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Arts of Japan series : print #5 - printing begins

So here we go ... printing on our fishing scene gets under way, starting with the key block:

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Arts of Japan series : print #5 - block set finished

This 'snail' is inching forward bit by bit, and a few days after getting the key block finished, the colour set is now also ready for work. One side:

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New season coming ...

It has been pretty cold winter here in Ome this year - and everybody has said the same thing, so it's not just 'this guy' getting old! But we've had very little snow, and the sun has shone brightly day after day, so there is little to complain about.

Things are changing though this week - here's a shot of the little plum tree just outside our front door:

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Newsletter future ...

It was in the autumn of 1990 - just about a year after I sold my first woodblock prints - that I began publishing a newsletter about my life and work. I named it Hyakunin Issho ('A Hundred People Together') because my work at the time was structured around making the Hyakunin Isshu ('A Hundred Poems from A Hundred People') print series, and I was shooting for a total of around a hundred collectors.

After the poetry series was over I of course continued issuing it, and just kept the same name, coming to think of the 'hundred people' as simply representing my collectors in general, and it has appeared without fail four times a year since then ...

But the New York Times isn't the only publishing company wrestling with how to move their publications into the digital age, as I too have to try and figure out what to do with my newsletter ...

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Support Forum update ...

A few years back, I published two eBooks on my work: 'David's Choice, Volume 1', a small multi-media visit to my print collection, and 'Your First Print', a beginner's guide to my printmaking process. To help make the books more interesting and useful to readers, I also set up an accompanying web forum where anybody could post comments and questions about any of the material in the books.

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