Written on May 20, 1991 [Permalink]

May 15

Wrapping and mailing day for the women. They work together pretty well now, and got it all done before noon. Ashida-san also brought in some of the folders she made with the jig she made herself, and they look great. They are much better made than any we've made up to now, smoother on the front, and tighter around the fold. We'll have to get her to fix up my old jig to match her new one.

Package of washi from Yamaguchi also arrived, so that means I'll have to get down to the Post Office and send him the money, over 100,000 yen each time, now that the price for each sheet is over 500 yen. I don't think we have that much, but with the prints going out today, it should be coming in soon ....

Had a visit last night from a Mr. Otsuka, who lives in Ome, and who saw the TV show last week. A strange visit. He wouldn't offer a meishi, and gave no details on what he did. He arrived with a sidekick, who didn't say much, but who somehow left the impression that he may have actually been the 'person of interest'. Otsuka-san brought in a folder of prints from his car to show us, mostly Meiji-era horrors, and while he was pulling each one from the file to show me, he was careful to slip the labels into his hand so that I couldn't read them. What gives? He was very interested in whatever I knew about the Shunsho book, where it might be found, prices, etc. Is he some kind of dealer? Who knows? When he left, he asked if he could return again, and bring some more originals to show me.... An interesting, if puzzling, visit.

Before going to bed, prepared 60 sheets for the second batch of Shun-e Hoshi [3-4].

May 16

Sumi on the 60 in the afternoon, between English classes. Took a call from Larry LaCoss just after finishing, and got the bad news - he is returning to America and wishes to stop his subscription. He's been with us for just over a year, having joined after reading Jean's column.

May 17

Another one! Mr. Oyama, one of the two people who signed up after reading the SERAI magazine, called today and told Michiyo to cancel his subscription. No reason. Was this last print that bad? I thought it was great! Two in two days. I don't think I'll answer the phone tomorrow!

Another phone call came, from Robbie Walker, who started her subscription just this year. Did she .....? No, but it was disturbing nonetheless. She says that the print she just received was damaged - with a crease running from top to bottom. Of course, I told her I would send another, and asked her to send this one back. Was it the Post Office, or just some kind of mark in the washi? We'll see when it comes back.

Colours on the 60, finishing a good two hours ahead of last week's time. Did I make more side trips last week? Something quite interesting came out during today's printing. I didn't notice it during the actual printing during the day, but picked it up when embossing the metal type after Yukiko's English class in the evening. The paper seemed especially smooth - quite silky and soft. It seemed perfect for printing. As I sat there feeling it, I remembered something Matsuzaki-san asked me last week ... something about whether or not my paper was 'yawarakai' when I was printing. At the time I didn't give it much attention, and just assumed he was simply asking me about the 'wetness' of the sheet. But sitting here tonight, feeling these incredibly 'yarawakai' sheets, I realized that this must be what he was talking about. It's not simply a matter of how much water is in the paper, but of how it is in there. I don't know how to describe this. After printmaking for just about 10 years now, you'd think I would have a bit better idea of what was going on. I certainly don't know how to reproduce what I felt tonight. I called Michiyo in to try and show her what I was seeing, and as I sat there talking to her and playing with the top sheet for about 10 minutes, the paper didn't change a bit. It didn't dry out at all as I waved it in the air. I've seen this same thing every time I visit Matsuzaki-san. His paper never seems to dry out, even with the window wide open right in front of this desk. Mine usually dries out stiff as a board if I so much as leave it exposed for a few seconds. What magic is this?

I think that from now on, I'm really going to have to concentrate on getting this moistening done properly. I've been relatively careless with it - slapping the water over the newspaper with a cheap old wallpaper brush that doesn't really hold enough water to do the job properly, and not really following the brushing patterns I've been shown. I suppose one day I'll learn the lesson - there are no inconsequential aspects of this work - every part of it, no matter how trivial it seems, is vitally important to making good prints. The details are everything. I should put this up on the wall in lights ....

Thank you again Matsuzaki-san, even if I didn't understand what you were talking about ....

May 18

Visit from Hazel Miller. Went through the usual routine, talking for a couple of hours, lunch, and then some printing. The resulting prints were quite different from previous occasions. She got a good grasp of the baren, really dug in there, and made good smooth colour. We ran three sheets - I did the first one, and she did the other two. There wasn't really enough colour in the brush on the first copy, and hers actually turned out better than mine. This was great, but I think she probably walked out of here with the idea that this is really pretty simple stuff. Wait 'till she tries it alone! I don't know if she'll be taking it up or not. She promised to send a copy of anything she made, and we'll just wait and see....

6 sheets of jumbo size paper wet in the evening for working on the colour samples of the poster tomorrow. Can't put it off any longer ...

May 19

So how did it go? Well, it's amazing what a little bit of 'bokashi' will do. It came together very well. The paper is quite strong (it's the torinoko paper we use for wrapping the Hyaku-nin Isshu prints), and takes a good impression. I tried two gradations - one in the sea area, and one in the sky. They look fine - for a beginner! Although the overall impression is good, the effect could be much improved with a couple more blocks and more overprinting. There's just no way I'm going to invest that much time in it. Printing the 100 copies is just going to take too much time as it is. Still, she looks pretty good, and I'm sure the chorus ladies will be knocked out.

60 sheets of torinoko wet early in the day, and did the sumi before going to bed.

May 20

Ouch! A long, long day of printing, finishing up with that wide blue background. This is really my first experience with making multiple copies of a print with a background, and I don't like it! I think that if Seki-san were printing this one, he would do the background in about three or four overlaid colours, but I know that I'll never be able to get the writing lined up if I try it that way, and this means that the whole thing top to bottom, side to side, has to be printed smoothly in one go. Of course, there are a lot of 'misses'. I'm doing it quite 'wetly' and this helps a bit, as the colour tends to even out as the water is absorbed into the paper. Didn't have enough time to finish the whole thing, two colours left for tomorrow....

May 21

Wrapped up the printing on the 60 posters. I think that 55 of them will be good enough to hang. It's a bit tough getting the hang of the large damp paper, and I dropped a few of them when placing them on the blocks yesterday. Now for a bit of English teaching, and then in a few days, the next 60.

A response came at last from the 'Was your grandfather a craftsman?' flyer. A Mr. Sato from the downtown office of the Yomiuri newspaper called, and we set up for an interview tomorrow afternoon. I was beginning to think that this one was going to bomb completely ....