Living Prints 'N Video Pioneers

On his 1978 visit, renown artist Akira Kurosaki presented a demonstration on his methods of using traditional Japanese woodblock printmaking for his colorful prints. 1627 Words. 3 Pages. Transcription Copyright 1997 Bill H. Ritchie, Jr.

The following is the sound track from "Kurosaki: Prints!"-a 55 minute videotape made in 1978 as Akira Kurosaki demonstrated how he prints a Japanese woodblock carving in the traditional manner.

The video begins as the introductions have already been made, and Kurosaki is already starting his demonstration. Bill Ritchie is introducing him. Izumi Kuroiwa, a graduate student at the University at the time this tape was made, stands by ready to translate.

Ritchie: The main virtue--well, one of the virtues of Mr. Kurosaki's visit, is his use of the the technique called bokashi, and it's what Americans call blended color or rainbow printing. You can see examples in his own work and while he's not the only artist using such a technique, he's one of the few contemporary artists who employed the technique effectively for his work. I took the liberty with his permission of putting up three reproductions of Japanese prints by artists dating from the eighteenth and nineteenth century--Hiroshige and Hokusai. I thought those would remind you of works you've seen before and you'd be able to see the original applications and make the connections this way.

Mr. Kurosaki is represented in collections around the world. He works at the Technical University in Kyoto in Japan, of course, and has traveled now, this is his third time to the United States. He came here first in 1973 and in 1976 and now he's back again. And hopefully he'll be here again in another couple of years. So I will leave it at that and give you Mr. Kurosaki.

Kurosaki: Japanese printmaking is very special to use water pigment instead of oil pigment. It has a special character for Japanese printmaking. Not only Japanese printmaking, but also Chinese and Koreans also use water pigment. (Gesturing to his prints hanging on stage) These are all of water pigment, use water pigment. But I am learning Western techniques and also using oil pigment, too.

I want to complete this one print; I [shall print] this plate. (Then he speaks in Japanese to Izumi Kuroiwa, who proceeds to explain the display arranged on-stage of plates and separate color prints. Kurosaki hammers in the background, attaching the wooden blocks to the work table before printing.)

Kuroiwa: He is going to print five printings which involve six colors. This is the first plate, this is the second plate which makes the second stage. This is the third print, plate, third stage. Fourth plate, fourth stage and finally the sixth and complete work.

And these four are water-based ink and the last one he uses oil-base. (She speaks to Kurosaki in Japanese before speaking further.)

He studied traditional Japanese woodcut under a traditional master printer, but his image is very contemporary and he uses this traditional way combining contemporary images and also he has tried to combine eastern and western ways of woodcut--these four water-based are traditional Japanese way, but also using oil-base is the western way, so he's combining these two different techniques in one print.

Mr. Ritchie explained about bokashi, this blending technique. What's special about blending technique is that in western you use oil-base pigment. You mix two inks on the slab with the roller, but it is going to be ____ on the paper. Instead, in water pigment, these two pigments, with wood-grain--wood-grain causes a capillary action--and blending the two pigments very naturally into each other.

And also this water pigment absorbs into the Japanese paper and becomes part of the paper. He explained once that water base [she meant tos ay oil-base ink] stays on the surface of the paper but he loves the quality that this pigment becomes part of the paper. So it's more dyed mechanics than applying ink on the paper.

We use kento registration. We have this corner mark, here, and line registration here. And he holds the paper a special way, like so, and puts the corner first, like this, and the second, drops it and makes a perfect registration for each block.

Kurosaki: So Japanese printmaking needs a bigger plate, more than the image's size. So each plate has each registration mark--corner registration mark and straight registration mark. (To Kuroiwa:) And also, could you explain this, uh paste? (He refers her to the wheat paste).

Kuroiwa: He cooked this paste with wheat flour. He cooked slowly with water--I think he cooked it about an hour. He mixed this glue--the paste--with the pigment. This allows the pigment [to] stick with the paper and also this makes the colors even. If you only use water pigment, you get spotty-type of printing. But his colors are very solid; this paste helps to achieve that.

Kurosaki: When I start printing, it needs a little time. But after then, this brush, this Japanese brush has lots of pigment and water and rice glue, [or] wheat glue. So I don't need so much time to print each or lots of editions.

Some (he asks Kuroiwa to explain further).

Kuroiwa: The traditional printer prints 400 prints a day....

Kurosaki: (Correcting her) Four hundred times.

Kuroiwa: Excuse me. Four hundred times, one stage, four hundred times each day because when he gains the rythm of these things he can print very fast.

What he tried to explain was that the first several times [he prints] the plate has to be seasoned with water, pigment and paste. But after several times this gets seasoned and it can go very fast.

As you notice, he prints twice for one stage, all the time. He would like to get very brilliant, strong colors. And twice-printing allows him to get this.

Kurosaki: And also, gradation parts have very beautiful gradations by twice-times printing.

Kuroiwa: He gets better gradation effects by printing twice. (She asks him something in Japanese about the table. He acknowledges.)

He is using a special table here--slanting. The reason--there are two reasons for this special desk. One... (Kurosaki says he'll show, and Kuroiwa suggests she waits until he can demonstration; then he proceeds, step-by-step).

When you...well, I better wait until he puts the paper in, then I will explain better. (Pause) When he puts the paper into the registration mark that way, then he drops the paper at an angle keeps the paper clear of the plate. And also the paper drops flat on the plate. Also, the power with which he uses on the baren to press the print.... The human body is such that the hand works this way, it doesn't work straight. So with having this slanting table, he gets better effect, better, more power going working this way, towards the body.

(Trying to be heard over Kurosaki's pounding of another nail to fasten another plate) He stabilizes the plate.

Kurosaki: I'm going to print...(he switches to Japanese and Kuroiwa completes his sentence.)

Kuroiwa: He's printing an edition of three to complete the whole process of printing, and ends up with the three complete prints. Now he's going to the second stage-- (she asks him a question) --this, the black and white portion.

The same effect here. (She checks with Kurosaki for what she is about to add.) Another thing about Japanese blending, bokashi method. They don't use white pigment; they use only sumi and water. So, it's ____ on getting this and this blend more water--it gets a more beautiful effect since the water evaporates later and all we have here is sumi, the light value of the sumi.

Kurosaki: When you start to print water pigment on the woodblock, you have to dampen it first. Because the wood plate also absorbs a lot of ink and water. So if you dampen the plate first, the plate will not absorb so much ink and not dry so fast.

Kuroiwa: This Japanese water-base printing requires a lot of humidity. Actually, with this light, this water is drying out and maybe it is not perfect state. Also, he explained you have to dampen the plate itself before you start printing.

Kurosaki: If people have questions, I can still answer.

Kuroiwa: Feel free to ask any questions. He can answer it. He can stop anytime.

Kurosaki: I'll not stop printing.

Kuroiwa: He'll not stop demonstrating....

Kurosaki: And I can hear

Kuroiwa: I'm trying to cover as many things as possible that he explained the other day.

Kurosaki: Can you see this gradation? It is almost all the effect of capillary action. You cannot make a beautiful gradation with the direction of the grain [of the wood]. You have to always make a gradation--oh, I made a mistake. You cannot make a gradation against the direction of the grain. But you can make a gradation with the grain. (To Kuroiwa) Can you explain that?

Kuroiwa: Sure. When he’s doing this blending, the grain runs this way, against the blending so that the water travels, with pigment, along with the grain, and with a capillary action, and blends with each other.

Kurosaki: And this paper dampening.

Kuroiwa: He also needs to keep the paper dampened. So he uses wet, dampening newsprint in-between prints. He keeps the prints in between damp newsprints.

Question: (Inaudible, the questioner wants to know what kind of wood he uses to cut his blocks.)

Kuroiwa: What kind of wood is it? (She asks Kurosaki in Japanese, is it birch?) It’s a plywood, he is using a kind of cedar, but it is made in Japan. It’s different. I found Japanese plywood--the glue is softer and easier to cut. Also, this cedar doesn’t have too strong a grain. But in this country when I get cedar plywood it has a very strong grain.

In his class--he’s teaching woodcut and collagraph--we use birch plywood. Traditionally they use plank wood, cherry and other semi-hard woods. But he is trying to find an easier way, a faster way, and this plywood--for him--this plywood works perfectly.

Question: Is it a strong grain?

Kuroiwa: Not a very strong grain.

Kurosaki: But a very fine grain. I am using this plywood [because] I can make a very big print like that (pointing to his art, hanging behind him, about 40 inches high by 24 inches wide). I cannot get such a big size plate of cherry or magnolia--it’s a special magnolia in Japan--it’s really quite difficult to get such a big sized plate. So, next is the red.

Kuroiwa: The third stage--actually he separated this into two spaces--he’s going to print red. (She asks him something in Japan.)

Actually, originally, he ordered special ink to make special pigments for himself from a pigment company to get a very strong red or blue to get exactly the right pigment. They use 100 percent powdered pigment and mixed it with gum arabic.

Kurosaki: And also I think you would have a lot of interest in seeing this brush. It’s like a shoe-shine brush. This is a more modern one, but older master printers for printmaking used such a style of brush, and make these kinds of old prints. (He defers to Kuroiwa.)

Kuroiwa: I’m going to explain this brush. These are specially made by a craftsman. They’re a very expensive brush. It’s a horse-hair brush, and very tight or dense, you might call it. After he buys it, he burns the hair, the tips of the hairs, with a hotplate. Then he rubs this brush and splits the tips of the hairs with sharkskin to make it much softer.

Why horse hair? The reason is that it has a very strong body which he needs when he brushes the ink on the plate. But he also needs very fine tips to not get the brush marks on his prints. So that’s why he has split the tips with sharkskin. (She asks Kurosaki if he would like to tell the audience about his substitutions).

Kuroiwa: A process that he’s trying to do while he’s teaching in this country is that, since it is very hard to obtain these special tools locally, he’s trying to make new tools out of local materials. The sharkskin is very hard to find. Even in Japan he has difficulty in obtaining them and treating them in a certain way.

He went to a hardware store and he found so-called dragonskin. This is--we didn’t bring it here today--it’s a kind of sandpaper. (To Ritchie) What do you use it, usually, the dragonskin, for?

Ritchie: For sanding.

Kuroiwa: Sanding. It’s very coarse for sanding, and you can hurt your skin with it, but he found it is very convenient and a good substitute for sharkskin. It come in [4 X 4 inch size] this size so he put about six of them on a wood plate and we split them this way [she gestures as if holding a brush, moving it along the row of steel dragonskin pieces] about seven times each direction.

I asked him if dragonskin is better than sharkskin, but he said no. Not really. The reason is that sharkskin has only one direction of this, it’s not fur, but these needle-like things, which gives very nice, even splitting. But dragonskin is just a metal which is punched out, and has this kind of teeth and the direction is random, so it doesn’t get as nice as he expected. But he is going to use it in Japan. It’s very good.

Kurosaki: There are lots of sharks in Japan and in the United States also, but it’s very difficult to get only sharkskin.

Kuroiwa: This shark is one special kind of shark. Every shark does not have the same skin, and also it is very hard to skin them and flatten them on the board.

Kurosaki: (To Kuroiwa, he asks her to describe the American shoeshine brush.)

Kuroiwa: He made a similar brush. This is an American shoeshine brush and he found it workable, very well. He had to treat with the burning and splitting, and it worked very well, too, has a strong body. But this one (the Japanese original) is much--more hair....(She asks Kurosaki something in Japanese.)

He explains this (holding a smaller brush to compare it to another larger Japanese brush) is a rather traditional way of brush [design] and this is a rather modern one. This is because of a need for bigger prints--people were producing larger-sizes of prints and you cannot make a big brush with this method so they decided to make this kind of brush, which allows him to make big prints like the ones on the wall.

And as you notice, he’s using one brush for one stage of color, because even if you wash them it’s very hard to wash the pigment out.

Now, he’s ___ on to this plate. Since I have some time I am going to explain how he transfers the image into separate colors. (She gets a point of clarification from him in Japanese regarding the kento and key plate.)

The old-fashioned way, the traditional way, is first they have key blocks and color blocks. First he carves the key blocks, the black and white, this way. Then he prints on thin Japanese paper and pastes them on each board. You can see, right here. (She shows an example where some of the remains of the thin paper remains). Then he knows which square [part of the design] is which color. So he only carves certain colored areas in each plate and makes a color separation.

He also uses a modern way, too. His imagery is very geometric which allows him to use carbon paper. He sometimes uses--makes a drawing on a sort of transparent tracing paper [frosted mylar] and using carbon paper, he draws on to each plate. At that time it is very important to have this registration mark transfer, too. This determines the registration of each print.

(Kurosaki adds something in Japanese) He said with the larger size of work he uses carbon paper because it is very hard to paste this print--key block print--on the board. (Kurosaki again makes a comment in Japanese, this time about papers.)

He explained about his paper. He makes them--he orders them special from a paper craftsman. This is kozo paper. Kozo is a fiber from what you call mulberry. But this contains only fifty percent mulberry and fifty percent woodpulp. The Japanese kozo paper, the good paper, the better, the more you have of this kozo fiber, the better paper you get. But he wants a very smooth surface.

Hundred percent kozo paper gives a very rough surface and he cannot get the effect in the print that he wants. So uses fifty percent kozo and fifty percent wood pulp.

Kurosaki: There are very beautiful one-hundred percent mulberry papers in Japan, but sometimes one-hundred percent mulberry paper will not make a very beautiful color. Sometimes the color is quite...faint. (To Kuroiwa, he asks for the right expression).

Kuroiwa: Hmm...here comes a very difficult part of the translation, we call it shibui. The color is not a brilliant as he wants when he uses kozo paper. He explains...it gets a little dull.

Kurosaki: (He goes to the reproductions of Hiroshige and Hokusai to compare the paper’s effect on color) You can see here. It’s almost one-hundred percent kozo, printed by--I think--but I’m not sure, printed by eighty or hundred percent mulberry paper. But it becomes--the colors become dull. So, it’s used for old traditional prints. Old traditional prints should be, like, faded out. Imitating old prints.

Kuroiwa: Well, these were originally eighteenth and nineteenth century prints, but now in Japan they are reproducing them to market all over the world. But they use old traditional way, and also this kozo paper, to make the color dull. They prefer it because it makes it look more like an antique quality. (Kurosaki is nailing another block t his printing table in the background).

For his prints he wants very brilliant color and the fifty percent wood pulp containing paper works well with him. But each artist differs from each other and they make special orders to the Japanese paper craftsman. Kurosaki: Making hand-made paper is very popular in Japan. And there are lots of paper villages and lots of paper masters in Japans. And they expect artists to order their own paper for printmaking and calligraphy or painting. So it is very easy in Japan to order your own paper.

I can order my watermark and probably from three hundred sheets to over three hundred papers [I] will be able to order. So many of my friends from the United States and England are glad to have such as [this] their own paper.

Ritchie: I don’t know if everybody here knows what the watermark is but if you--after he’s finished--you can see it in the bottom edge of the print. It wouldn’t show unless you are as close as I am. Does it say--“A Kurosaki”? It’s stamped into the paper when the paper is made, through a special signature in the screen on which the paper is laid. That’s called the watermark.

Kuroiwa: Once he explained that he changed the watermark every year...every time that he ordered so that he remembers, or he has ___ that which watermark was made when and he can identify the print easily.

Ritchie: It’s interesting, he had to cut--the block he’s printing now--he had to re-cut--(to Kurosaki for confirmation) isn’t that the block you had to recut? He explained to me that it was so worn out--not necessarily the edges so worn out--but the block had been printed so many hundreds of times he had to re-cut it. And to do this all he had to do was to use was one of those pre-printed key prints pasted on to this new piece of plywood and then re-cut it.

So you see those prints on the board (the reproductions of Hiroshige and Hokusai) were cut in the 1800s and were printed in 1974--probably--from blocks newly-cut simply by maintaining the design and re-cutting the blocks over and over again. So once the artist has established the design and the key block, they can be printed indefinitely by cutting new blocks.

Kurosaki: Water pigment will finish by this block.

Kuroiwa: He’s reached the fourth stage and he’s going to finish he water-base pigment printing. I am going to explain about this special tool for pressing. We call it the baren. This is made of about three parts. One, two three, yes. This is a bamboo sheath, outside. This a knotted, twisted bamboo fiber--which is going to need more explanation and also this (in Japanese she confirms its name) ategawa, we call it which holds this one in between, the bamboo sheath.

This (the ategawa) is made out of rice--Japanese paper, about a hundred fifty to two hundred Japanese papers. The craftsmen make them. One sheet of paper a day. And they paste them to each other and dry them this way. I can see some writing--they are using old papers.

This one (holding up the coiled fiber part) this piece costs five-hundred dollars. This is made by a special craftsman.. They take the bamboo sheath, and they only use about an inch of the bottom of the bamboo sheath and get the fiber--this thing. You do not get very much, so you need about a hundred sheath--maybe more--bamboo sheaths to get [enough].

Then this craftsman twists them this way--not exactly this stage--but makes a twisted fiber, and connect them to this length. It takes a lot of time and craftsmanship. That is why it is so expensive.

This is going to be (Kurosaki helps her un-sheath a demonstration baren) coiled in this manner, and held in position with string. This by the way is not bamboo sheath. He is trying to find some other material to replace it.

Okay. This knot, and the fiber of the bamboo sheath, running this way, gives the pressure. His power is concentrated on this combined place where the fiber and the knot are crossing. And this gives a lot of power on the block. If it were just flat, his power is just spread, and he cannot get very strong pressure. (She consults with Kurosaki.) The baren he is using now costs about seven hundred or nine hundred dollars.

Kurosaki: There are lots of baren makers in Japan, but there are very few who make a real bamboo cord and real baren cover--how do you call this--ategawa?

Kuroiwa: This black thing. This black is lacquer. (Kurosaki explains in Japanese the purpose of using lacquer to seal the paper-bodied ategawa). This lacquer, he says, when the printer prints, it involves a lot of exercise and his hands get wet from the perspiration and sweat. This prevents the water from going into the baren. (Kurosaki nails another block, and Ritchie interrupts to ask for clarification.)

Ritchie: I have a question about the baren, about making of the cord. Izumi said only one inch of the leaf ... Kuroiwa: Not a leaf, a sheath.

Ritchie: Sheath? Okay--what, at the base? In other words....

Kurosaki: They have this shape, like a ship, the shape of a ship.

Ritchie: Can you draw a picture?

Kurosaki: Yeah, I can draw a picture. (He goes to the board and draws a shape like that of a ship’s hull seen from above, with a square stern at the bottom of the sketch.) Bamboo sheath is like a this shape. Bamboo sheath--not the bamboo itself--they have like....(Kuroiwa comments in Japanese).

Ritchie: (Aside) These bamboo are what we call timber bamboo, very large trunks, with six-inch diameter trunks....

Kurosaki: We used to wrap the baren with this part, right? And cut off this part (he draws a dotted cut line from the squared-off portion).

Ritchie: Okay, that’s the wrapper.

Kurosaki: And this part is too hard, it’s very stiff, and very strong, like leather. So, we cannot use this part, so we cut this part and keep this one for making the bamboo cord. Craftsmen collect such [parts] of the bamboo sheath and--how to say--split each string or fiber, like this. (He sketches the fibers). By using such a special tool--with lots of needles, and splits it this way.

Ritchie: I thought that’s what you said, but I didn’t believe it! (Chuckling at his dismay.)

Kurosaki: So, it takes almost two weeks to make a four-meter bamboo cord. About four meters--so, about twelve feet--I think about twelve feet to make this size, for making such a small one. Sometimes the craftsman using these find them too short, too difficult, so they use the whole sheath, this size. So they become too weak. [Such a] bamboo cord will not get you a good one.

Ritchie: (Facetiously) So those are cheaper barens, maybe only two-hundred dollars, right? (Snickering) Kurosaki: Yeah, and you can find some small cotton string ones for a dollar or fifty cents but it doesn’t work at all. Also you can find Speedball, American bamboo called Speedball--and it doesn’t work at all. It’s much better to use this coaster.

Ritchie: Yes, he pointed out some import shops are selling this kind of thing for coasters and hot pads. (Showing an example). And they seem to be possibilities. This one has wire?

Kurosaki: Iron cord.

Ritchie: This has wire? Oh yeah, like picture wire? No? Just wire? You twisted this yourself?

Kurosaki: I didn’t twist this, but my printer twisted this. And also, cotton, this big one. No no, this one. You can take off the sheath. It’s hemp string. This part is hemp.

Ritchie: Hemp is harder than cotton? (Kurosaki resumes noisily attaching a block to his printing table.)

Kuroiwa: Again, he is trying to find some, using local material to make barens. In our class we made barens out of cotton cord and twisted them very strongly with an electric drill. We twisted them about one, two, three times? Four times. Four times, (thank you). Four strings and we made coil out of this and tied them together. And we used thin plywood and or lacquered cardboard for the ategawa. And we could use different materials to wrap them.

(In the background you can hear the thumping and rolling of the brayer with oil-based ink.)

Kurosaki: I think people belief woodcut would be only for relief print, only for printing relief-part. But woodcut can also make intaglio prints. (To Kuroiwa) Would you like to explain what I did in my class?

Kuroiwa: (To Ritchie) Would you like to explain this relief and intaglio difference?

Ritchie: It’s true what he said, woodcut usually is thought of as a relief printing process, which means that the ink is transferred from the high places, only from the top of the relief that is carved. So when he uses the brayer, as he is now, a roller, it is putting ink only on the tops of the relief. And when he makes his impression, that’s the only area that will print.

He’s been some work with printing the woodblock the same way an etching would be printed, and that way is called intaglio printing--where the ink comes from below--from the textures and areas between the high areas. This usually involves running the woodcut through an etching press. (To Kurosaki) Have you done it without a press?

Kurosaki: I use a press. And I use a water pigment. Some people intaglio is will be only by oil pigment, but it is possible to print water pigment, so I....

Ritchie: Is that with Liquitex (an acrylic medium)?

Kurosaki: You can use this also (pointing to the wheat paste).

Ritchie: The same. The wheat paste.

Kurosaki: Yeah. Um hmm. To make it dry slow. You need to make it dry slowly. Okay, it’s finished. Not the same color I’m sorry.

Kuroiwa: He isn’t using the same pigment....

Kurosaki: Because I am using Winsor Newton--famous Winsor Newton gouache instead of Japanese pigment. And also I would like to explain this important block. I think you explained already, but I want to show how to transfer. I haven’t the special paper right now, but it is possible, a very simple way to print the key block with registration mark and print, transfer to another block.

Kuroiwa: This is actually the key block he uses. Now he is using it as an oil-base printing plate. But he is going to show how to transfer the image into a new block. And he is going to print all the plate, including the registration mark.

Kurosaki: It is important to include the registration mark. (He is inking the block).

Kuroiwa: He doesn’t have the special paper--thin paper--to do this, but he is using the same paper. But it should be a thinner paper to do this.

Kurosaki: Only making the image [in register] by the corner of the plate would be very dangerous. You cannot fix the paper exactly.

Kuroiwa: You might think this straight corner might serve as a registration mark, but sometimes paper stretches or there are certain natural movements of the plate itself even when you transfer the registration mark you have to make certain corrections. So in having this kind of registration mark, you can make it lower or higher with another technique. So you can change it as required, shown by your test printing, instead of using just a corner edge, you need a special (long) registration mark.

Kurosaki: Okay, I can print it, right? (Aside) I think this table is bumpy. (He prints the oil-based ink to the paper).

Kuroiwa: He is using the offset ink technique instead of pasting the paper on [in the traditional manner]. With oil base ink this can be done, also.

Kurosaki: So you can see exactly the registration, it’s just the same. So you can see the key block, the key print here, so if you want these two triangles [in the design] you can leave this part, and take off another part. It’s a very easy way to make a color plate--several color plates.

Ritchie: Okay, now, before we start questions and so forth I wanted to be sure the people in the University had their due credit. The Japan Foundation for paying for his airfare to come over. The School of Art,, of course for sponsoring his teaching this summer. And the Office of Lectures and Concerts for sponsoring this particular lecture. Instructional Media Services is taking care of the videotape recording. Izumi Kuroiwa, thank you, and Anne Middleton our special camera woman an art student who knows just what to look for.

(Applause)

Kurosaki: Okay, you can see my things by being close if you want, if you have an interest. (The audio fades as people begin to mill around the stage.)

"Living Prints" is a trade mark of Bill Ritchie's, providing a database of print making information in multi-media.

Afterword:

The northwest became a lively center for experiments in art and technology in the 1960s and '70s. Print makers contributed by bridging old-time hand processes, electronic imaging and the world of business. Bill Ritchie, as Ritchie's Video, started in printmaking and video art. Transcribed by Bill Ritchie in 1997.