Exhibition of the Month: Japanese Prints in Minneapolis
The practice of Japanese woodblock prints goes back centuries, but a new exhibition at the Minneapolis Institute of Art focuses on notable practitioners from a relatively recent time in the history of Japanese prints. “Seven Masters: 20th-Century Japanese Woodblock Prints from the Wells Collection” features 112 works from the late-19th and early-20th centuries, and the show is Drawing magazine’s exhibition of the month for November.
“Seven Masters” traces the evolution of shin hanga, a movement in Japanese printmaking that flourised from the 1910s to 1940s. “During the early 20th century, when all art forms were undergoing unprecedented changes, a small group of artists created beautiful and enticing prints that captured Japan’s dynamic, modern life,” said Andreas Marks, the MIA’s Mary Griggs Burke Curator of Japanese and Korean Art. “Shin hanga employed the highest production values of traditional Japanese printmaking within a very new social context and market. This exhibition explores seven artists’ unique approaches to the modernization of Japanese culture and, by showcasing the diversity of this critical art form, seeks to offer insight into the world of this phenomenon.”
Below, you can enjoy a few examples of the prints on view in the exhibition, which runs through March 13, 2016. A 288-page catalogue accompanies the show. For more information, visit artsmia.org.
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