Description
Kawase Hasui (Japanese, 1883Ā1957)
Mt. Fuji Seen from the River Banyu, 1931
The woodblock prints of Kawase Hasui (Japanese, 1883Ā1957) have delighted the West with quiet images of a rural Japan. Images are decidedly of the seasons, bringing the viewer onto a lakeside bank amid gathering snow or through a sunny garden where irises brush bare ankles. Clouds roll or roil above varied landscapes that are given depth with the inked layers inherent to Japanese woodblock printing of the shin hanga, or "new prints," movement.
Hasui created more than six hundred images during his career, collaborating with publisher Watanabe Shozaburo's skilled team to meticulously transform his watercolor sketches into prints. By 1956 he had contributed forty years to Japanese art and was honored as a "Living National Treasure." - INDIVIDUAL ITEM RRP Ā£1.992