04 August 2005

Azechi Umetaro


One of my favorite Japanese moku hanga artists is Azechi Umetaro. I love the simplicity and boldness of the colors and the shapes and the quirky characters he invents. You can read about his life here.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi Annie,

Beautiful print, and it would be a pretty complicated image for Azechi. It has a mountain in the background which was his main love. Most of his prints were of mountaineers. I have a really useful book of his; Japanese Woodblock Prints, Their Techniques and Appreciation. It has lots of really good tips for getting some of those Sosaku hanga textures. This print is also remarkably similar to one I have by Maseo Maeda. Maybe these are special trees - Japan has lots of revered trees that strike weird and wonderful poses.

Annie B said...

Thanks, Tom, that sounds like a book I need to have for my library! I'll look around for it. The print I posted here was at the sosaku hanga exhibit I went to in Tokyo in June. They had three of Azechi's works, all landscapes, and all seemed atypical in the way you've described - fairly complicated, more "realistic," and not about mountaineers.

Cin said...

wonderful link, Annie, thank you for the introduction to this artist, I liked very much what little I saw, for the same reasons you stated, especially the quirky characters! Looks like you're going to be the cause of another book purchase!