General | Japanese Art

Toshi Yoshida produced three sets of woodblock prints for the Franklin Mint. The Friendly Garden (consisting of 3 prints), Birds of the Seasons (consisting of 4 prints) and a 12 print “calendar print” set depicting birds and flowers.

The official name for the 12 woodblock print series is “The Flowers and Birds of the Oriental Year” and was it produced in 1982. The Certificate of Authenticity for the prints says…

“This is to certify that the print accompanied by this certificate is one of 12 original Surimono woodblock prints in The Flowers and Birds of the Oriental Year collection created by Toshi Yoshida and issued in limited edition by the Franklin Gallery.

It is further certified that Mr. Yoshida has hand-impressed his personal signature mark on this work to indicate that it meets with his approval.”

Surimono translates literally into “printed thing,” and generally indicates a print that was privately issued or limited edition commissioned prints that are not placed on public sale.

I’ve not previously seen the entire calendar print set displayed together on the web before so have listed them here for reference (n.b. I don’t own this set).

The woodblock prints are chuban size with what appears to be the standard Yoshida/Franklin-Mint teak frames with rounded edges. Unlike the much larger sized Friendly Garden and Birds of the Seasons prints the mats are not silk covered. I don’t know if that’s usual or these particluar prints have been re-matted however the back board of the frames have a large label in kanji so appear to be original. Presumably this patricular set below was for the Japanese market.

01 January 225x300 Toshi Yoshida Franklin Mint Calendar Prints

January – Mutsuki – 睦月

02 February 225x300 Toshi Yoshida Franklin Mint Calendar Prints

February – Kisaragi – 如月

03 March 225x300 Toshi Yoshida Franklin Mint Calendar Prints

March – Yayoi – 弥生

04 April 225x300 Toshi Yoshida Franklin Mint Calendar Prints

April – Uzuki – 卯月

05 May 225x300 Toshi Yoshida Franklin Mint Calendar Prints

May – Satsuki – 早月

06 June 225x300 Toshi Yoshida Franklin Mint Calendar Prints

June – Minazuki – 水無月

07 July 225x300 Toshi Yoshida Franklin Mint Calendar Prints

July – Fumizuki – 文月

08 August 225x300 Toshi Yoshida Franklin Mint Calendar Prints

August – Hazuki – 葉月

09 September 225x300 Toshi Yoshida Franklin Mint Calendar Prints

September – Nagatsuki – 長月

10 October 225x300 Toshi Yoshida Franklin Mint Calendar Prints

October – Kannazuki – 神無月

11 November 225x300 Toshi Yoshida Franklin Mint Calendar Prints

November – Shimotsuki – 霜月

12 December 225x300 Toshi Yoshida Franklin Mint Calendar Prints

December – Shiwasu – 師走

Update:28/11/2012 – These prints were all sold at auction in Japan last night for around Y4200 ($50~) each.

Seven of them are now listed on eBay with a starting pricing of $85USD. At that price the Japan auction winner (not me, I didn’t bid) will make a nice profit but they’re still good value to anyone interested in acquiring them. It’s a pity the Japan auction winner couldn’t get the full set to keep it together. The seven prints are the Japanese version with Kanji labellng on the verso and it will be hard to acquire the other five Kanji labelled versions to complete the set.

Interestingly (well to me at least) is that the new owner has listed them on eBay already. The same pics from the Japanese auction were used on the eBay listings but presumably he/she doesn’t yet have the woodblock prints in their possession? (unless last nights buyer was also the seller).

Update:30/11/2012 – 6 Sold on e-Bay for $125 each!
It looks like six of the eBay auctions for these woodblock prints were converted from bidding starting at $85 to “Buy it Now” for $125 and they all sold to a single buyer so I expect that was done by arrangement. The seventh woodblock print already had 1 bid so has been left to run. The prints initially sold in Japan on the 28th for about $50USD each so for the six woodblock prints sold so far thats a very nice profit of $450~ (before costs) for the seller. Not bad for something they owned for 2 or 3 days

Update:04/12/2012 – Final woodblock print sold on e-Bay for US $234.50.
The seventh Toshi Yoshida woodblock print (October – Kannazuki – 神無月) sold for $234.50 last night.

As mentioned in my previous post on woodbock printmaker David Bull he is working in collaboration with Jed Henry on a series of woodblock prints from designs of Jed’s Ukiyo-e Heroes work. The Kickstarter project to fund both the digital/giclee side (Jed’s work) and the wooddblock print side (Dave’s work) was very successfull and will enable them to produce the complete Ukiyo-e Heroes works in both digital/giclee and woodblock print formats.

Production of the prints is proceeding well although obviuously making the woodblock prints takes much longer than the giclee prints. The delivery dates for production of the woodblocks prints extends out for nearly 12 months. To keep buyers up-to-date with the woodlbock print production progress Dave’s is regularly posting blog and video updates on his website http://mokuhankan.com/conversations/index.html. Among the video updates are 4 dealing with carving the key woodblock and colour woodblocks for the print Fox Moon. I’ve embeded those videos below as they provide a good summary of the woodblock production process.

Recorded in the Tokyo workroom of woodblock printmaker David Bull, the video belows shows the first stages of production of the next print in Jed Henry’s ‘Ukiyoe Heroes’ series – ‘Fox Moon’. It illustrates how Jed’s design – which comes to Dave in a Photoshop file – ends up on the surface of a hard cherry block, ready to carve.

The following video is the second video in the series showing the production of Jed Henry’s ‘Fox Moon’ design (from his ‘Ukiyoe Heroes’ series). It shows the three basic stages of carving the key block for the print.

The video below is the third episode in the series of videos showing the production of the woodblock print version of Jed Henry’s ‘Fox Moon’ design (from his ‘Ukiyoe Heroes’ series). This one show how the colour blocks are designed and carved.

Update:02/12/2012 – The fourth video (below) showing the woodblock print production process was added.
The fourth episode in the series documenting the production of Jed Henry’s Fox Moon woodblock print, this one shows Dave pulling the first proof copy. This is ‘real time’ – you see the pigments being brushed onto the wood, and the paper being rubbed, exactly as it really happens while making a print.

Noriyuki USHIJIMA (1900-1997) was a renowned Japanese landscape painter. Born and raised in Hihongi in Kumamoto City his schooling was often neglected in favour of painting and as a result was not the most successful of students. Much of his work is from the local area and his many landscapes often feature water scenes of the Tsuboi River and Lake Ezu in Kumamoto. The water landscapes show clam flat water and he is quoted as saying he doesn’t like scenes with high waves or rough water so doesn’t paint them.

Whilst USHIJIMA is known as a painter (oils and watercolour) there are also woodblock prints that bear his name. I’ve uploaded the two that I possess to the woodblock print gallery.

Noriyuki USHIJIMA - Izu Fishing Village

Noriyuki USHIJIMA - The Fishing Village of Shimoda

There seems to be very little detail about the woodblock prints generally available (in english at least). In total I’ve only seen around 12-14 woodblock prints in books and catalogues with every print being from an edition of 150. A number of his woodblock prints are ‘copies’ of his paintings. It appears that two collections of his woodlbocks were produced with each containing six prints which are shown in the images below.

Noriyuki Ushijima Woodblock Collection a 183x300 Noriyuki USHIJIMA Woodblock Prints

Image from http://www2.big.or.jp/~adel/kato-hanga/index.shtml

Noriyuki Ushijima Woodblock Collection b 300x213 Noriyuki USHIJIMA Woodblock Prints

Image from http://www.theartofjapan.com

The Toshi Yoshida gallery has been updated with two recently acquired woodblock pints, Linnoji Garden (1941) and Yodo River (1942). Both prints are chuban sized, pencil signed lifetime editions.

A new woodblock print gallery called Other Artists has been created for the purpose of uploading other works I have but where I don’t actively seek to acquire works by those artists. Single prints by Hashiguchi Goyo (Rain at Yabakei), Ishikawa Toraji (Ugo Harbour), Micah Schwaberow (Above Yamashitas) and Sanzo Wada (Farming Family – given title) have been uploaded to that gallery.

As a collector of Japanese Woodblock Prints I also have an interest in how they are made and recently I’ve been following the activities of David Bull a woodblock printmaker living in Tokyo. His website and blog contain a large number of interesting articles on woodblock print making and related topics and I highly recommend you take some time to look at his site.

The site is pretty large so here are some links to parts of the site I’ve enjoyed reading and found to be educational.

To see examples of the print making process visit River in Summer to see a slideshow demonstrating the printing process for the River in Summer print from his My Solitudes series. There’s a printing process slideshow for each print in the series.

Even better, he has a series of blog posts which shows the process but with an added explanation of what’s happening and why. The printing phase starts from river_in_summer_14.html onwards. The design and carving phase starts from river_in_summer_13.html (nb. 13 leads to 1, then 2…. it doesn’t go straight to 14).

River in Summer David Bull Tokyo Printmaker

River in Summer by David Bull from the My Solitudes Woodblock Series

He also runs a webcam from his studio for several hours a day and that can be found at http://woodblock.com/webcam/webcam.php5en – typically mornings seem to be mostly prinitng related (by his trainees/assistants) where-as the evenings tend to be printing and carving related (by Dave himself). There’s also a woodlbock print making encyclopedia with sections on Tools, Materials, Printmaking, Tech notes.

As part of his collaborative publishing venture Mokuhankan Dave has been working on a project with illustrator Jed Henry (http://www.facebook.com/UkiyoEHeroes) looking at possibly producng copies of Jeds Ukiyoe Heroes work as woodblock prints. He’s finished carving the blocks for the Mario Kart print and has recorded videos showing the carving and first proof printing process which can be seen on YouTube.

His latest blog updates can be found at woodblock.com (his personal work) and mokuhankan.com (his co-operative work).