The Art of the Print

Gallery One - The Art of the Print - Single Sheet Prints

Gallery Two - The Art of the Print - Multi-sheet Prints

Art of the Print at Toshidama Gallery

The current exhibition of prints at Toshidama includes examples of eighteenth century engraving and twentieth century silkscreen printing from notable artists in each discipline alongside truly great prints from nineteenth century woodblock artists, Kuniyoshi, Yoshitaki and Kunichika.

The idea of reproduction in terms of visual arts carries with it a sometimes sniffy reaction as if prints were somehow less important… a lesser art form than drawing or painting or sculpture. Turn this idea over for a while and we see that far from being a poor cousin, the artisan-made print… engraving, woodblock, etching etc. has a greater relevance politically and culturally today than the unique object.

The woodblock print exists without a previous iteration as a painting or drawing. It does however exhibit all of the qualifying characteristics of a genuine-made piece of art. Thus it sits between the unique object of the wealthy collector and the mundane food wrapper of yesterday’s news. A demotic form, the woodblock was both ‘high’ art and populist at the same time. I like very much, incidentally, that in such a huge genre as kabuki theatre prints, the actor/character sits in a similar world between role and performer. I think that dichotomy has an added depth in a print such as, Yoshitora’s Portrait of The Actor Nakamura Shikan as Gotobei. Are we admiring a unique, hand-made product or can we conceive a room filled with similar prints from the same blocks?  In tandem with that dilemma... are we admiring the career of Nakamura Shikan - his skill and his attributes - or are we thrilling to the conflicted character of Gotobei and his tightrope of drunkenness and sobriety; of loyalty and careless neglect?

The term 'print' carries the stigma of reproduction, as if there exists a superior original; but as we see in these examples, prints like these exist mainly without precedent; yet they do exist as one item of many that are nearly identical. For sure, their lack of uniqueness, or even relative rarity nevertheless make them seem to be painting’s lesser cousin. This should not be the case and Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720-1778) is a good example of an artist whose work exists solely in the art of the print. We are showing two of his magnificent etchings from the eighteenth century, works that were hugely influential precisely because of their distribution as multiples of the same image. Piranesi… archaeologist, antiquarian and artist created the neo-classical movement that followed the relentless publication of his huge prints in several volumes, picturing the remains of ancient Roman buildings. These exquisite prints, beautifully drawn and incredibly produced are becoming increasingly popular as the market at last turns its back on cheap reproductions and pale ‘wall-art’ in favour of work that inspires, redeems and beautifies.

The two twentieth century artists we are showing are also famous for their work in print. Ron Kitaj whilst known as  a draftsman and painter is equally credited with his revival of fine art printmaking through his relationship with the printmaker and print studio impresario Chris Prater. Together, throughout the sixties and seventies they encouraged fine artists such as David Hockney and Peter Blake to embrace the art of print as a unique and separate discipline. We are showing Kitaj’s exceptional portrait of Chris, a striking, bold mirror to the stunning okubi-e of the Yoshitora.

No Japanese prints of the nineteenth century were ‘limited’ editions… they were what are now called ‘open’ editions. In contemporary art business where relative cash value is ascribed to all works of art, the size of an edition, its origins, its provenance contribute to and affect its asset-value. In Edo Japan, woodblock prints were available to all… it is an irony that the sophisticated value that academics attach to the sequence of ‘editions’ (these are to do with block wear, colour variations and so on and are applied to valuable prints by artists such as Hokusai and Hiroshige), these values are as much to do with the influence of Japanese art on western painting as on anything inherent in the individual works themselves. In other words, we have come to affect the notional value of Japanese art precisely because of our own valuation of later western culture. A good example of this attitude is the spurious inclusion of van Gogh’s copies of Hiroshige’s The Plum Garden at Kameido, in the excellent recent British Museum  retrospective of that artist.

Perhaps a comment on this mixed up relationship, should reside with the Late American artist Michael Knigin. (1942 - 2011). His large scale and immaculate limited edition screen-prints collide the modern cityscapes of the United States with beautifully redrawn portraits and scenes taken from Edo-era woodblocks. The results are large-scale, stunning modern prints that comment archly on the commodification of culture and the loss of the casual world of the Edo artist.