Written on May 28, 1992 [Permalink]

May 28

Didn't get the colours finished in one day, and wasn't able to do it with just three printings, but had to use five. There just wasn't enough difference between the different brown shades, so carved a new block for the inner kimono area and used another colour. Also added a tint for the tassel thing that hangs down. I had originally thought about leaving it white, but rather than look like a piece of white fabric or something, it just looked as though I had forgotten it. It was interesting to note when it was done, that the focus of one's attention immediately goes to the white under kimono, the only area of the paper that I didn't touch!

70 sheets of paper wet in the evening for round two ...

Listened to the TV show last night on the stereo. It was an interesting program, not about foreigners studying Japanese culture, as I had thought it would be, but just about foreigners in Japan generally. (I feel bad for Yamashita-san. He got about 10 seconds!)

A bit of a surprise today, with three telephone calls from viewers. Pamphlets to one, a sample pak to another, and the third wants to come and visit. He's an amateur print maker, and wants to try his hand at Ukiyo-e. He kept the clipping from last year's Yomiuri newspaper story, but never got around to calling. Seeing the show last night gave him a jog ...

Bashed out a letter to the Eduardo Choissone Museum in Genova, Italy. I have a catalogue of a travelling exhibition of their prints and paintings that came to Japan last year (present from Yamashita-san), and I wrote to ask them about the possibility of reproducing one of their Kaigetsudo paintings. When we were doing the taping at Matsuzaki-san's place the other week, he said to the interviewer that 'David can never become a 'master' by doing only this Shunsho stuff ...' He meant that I would never get familiar with other techniques like bokashi, etc. if I simply kept on doing the same style pictures endlessly. Now as it happens, I do plan to 'upgrade' things gradually year by year, by adding more colour overlapping, bokashi gradations, 'kasuri' calligraphy carving, backgrounds, etc. etc., but it would be interesting to have a go at a real super deluxe print sooner, if I could squeeze in the time (perhaps in the summers?). This particular design would probably run to about 40-50 impressions, and would be pretty impressive if I could pull it off. I don't know if they'll go for it or not ...