Sōsaku-hanga
創作版画 / 1904–1960s / Style / Japanese Woodblock Prints
A movement that rejected the division of labor among designer, carver and printer and declared that one person draws, carves and prints. It chose to leave the trace of the maker's hand rather than technical perfection, taking the opposite road from the shin-hanga of the same years.
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At a glance
Visual cues
- Coarse lines that keep the marks of the knife
- Self drawn, self carved, self printed
- Tolerance for distortion and uneven inking
- Subjects personal to the artist
Best used for
- Making prints that keep the trace of the hand as a value
- Showing making in the first person rather than by division of labor
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Dictionary entry
- Type
- Cut hand carved letters into the block as part of the image.
- Composition
- Use the rectangle of the block itself as the frame.
- Material
- Keep the grain of the wood and the cut marks, and do not erase uneven printing.
- Caution
- Roughness itself is not the goal. The substance is the choice of what you take on with your own hands.
- Further study
- Yamamoto Kanae, Fisherman, 1904 / The founding of the Japan Creative Print Association / Its ideological opposition to shin-hanga
Related entries
- Shin-Hanga (新版画)Same Japanese Woodblock Prints lineage.Compare Sōsaku-hanga and Shin-Hanga
- Ukiyo-e (浮世絵)Same Japanese Woodblock Prints lineage.Compare Sōsaku-hanga and Ukiyo-e
Often confused with
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- https://indexstyle.org/styles/sosaku-hanga
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