Written on November 11, 1989 [Permalink]

November 7

A fabulous day of printing - 9:30 'till 6:30 - with 40 copies coming off. Spoiled? One! Actually, that's not completely true. The first couple of copies are registration adjustments, and thus useless, and there are a few with blotchy colour on the kimono (like I used to do - up until yesterday!). But for 8 impressions over 40 sheets, there were no blotches, drops, or accidents. Everything went perfectly relaxed and smoothly - up until the last impression of the last sheet. I know what you're thinking - he got careless at the end and screwed up, right? Well, I'm not sure. How would you explain a round orange blob of colour smack in the middle of a light coloured fan? There is no orange used in this print! The only orange in the house is an unopened package deep in the bottom of my pigment drawer. I guess it's some kind of punishment to try and keep me humble. (try ...)

I should say something about the tsubushi - namely that there is one on this print! It was the nori! I wasn't using anywhere near enough. There's a balance between the amounts of pigment, water, and paste being used (ignoring the paper moisture, block moisture, brush condition, weather, horoscope, etc. ...), and whenever I've tried adjusting the balance in favour of the nori before, the 'tamari' has put me off. Today I ignored that, and just went for the impression. It worked, and starting about 12 prints into the batch, the most smooth, beautiful tsubushi I've ever done started coming up. The brushing technique that Matsuzaki showed me last month is also responsible for part of it. I've been making the final smoothing brush stroke just as I've seen pro printers doing, softly and away from the body, but my definition of soft, and his, were somewhat different. His instructions were simple - if you can hear any sound from the brush on the block, you're brushing too hard. Any sound! What I tried doing today was just sort of waving the brush in the air in the general region of the block, and it makes a tremendous difference. The lines that are still visible on some of the prints also point up that my brushes are still not soft enough, even with the sharkskin rubbing that we've been doing.

It also seems like I made a mistake sending those two samples yesterday to my printer friends. This tsubushi is what they've been waiting to see!

November 9

During one of the evening classes, Seki-san called. Michiyo told me later that (for the first time!) he didn't criticize it! He mentioned that there was 'not enough nori' (now he tells me!), but apparently spoke well of this one. I must be getting better!

November 10

A couple of hours free before English classes, so wrote a couple of letters - one to the 'Nippon Ukiyo-e Kyokai', and one to send to the local branches of the 'Zen Nihon Karuta Kyokai'. As yet, there has been no reply to any of the 30-odd flyers sent out last week, so I guess its time to move on to the next plan.

Also started the carving on Taikenmonin Horikawa [1-8]. I feel positively peaceful about this one, after that endless kimono pattern, and the wide tsubushi on the last one.

November 11

Off to Tokyo for the meeting of the Poetry Society of Japan. Spent most of the day there, sitting by my display of prints and pamphlets (just like a convention or something ...). Most of the attendees stopped to look, and a few chatted for a while. Nobody was interested enough to sign up, but maybe (maybe) someone will call later.

When I got home I found the package of 100 backboards from Muse that I had ordered a few days ago. The recent shipments used up the last of the 50 folders I made a while ago, so its time to make some more. Worked 'till about 2:00 - cutting, folding and gluing.