Artist’s notes:

The rumble of trams is an uncommon sound now but in Toyohashi, Aichi Prefecture, trams are colourful and reliable additions to city life. At the depot, it began to rain, so my retreat was the tram shed… home of the oldest tramcar on the line. Then, the newest came in from the wet – history, side by side…

Japanese woodblock printing carries a long, rich history that reached its heights in the Edo period (1603 to 1867). Traditionally the art of creating a woodblock print was broken down into the following specialties*:

1. First, an artist would create a design.
2. From that drawing, a block copyist would create a very fine black-and-white drawing on paper.
3. The print would be passed on to blockcarvers who, using chisels, would carve a series of woodblocks—first, a “key block” showing the outlines of the print, and then one block for each color to be printed – often 15 or more blocks were required.
4. When the blocks were complete, printers would apply ink using brushes. Laying a sheet of paper face down on top of the block, the printer rubbed the ink onto [handmade] paper using a round, flat pad, called a “baren”.

David Stones applies these same techniques, with one great exception: all work is completely designed, hand-carved and hand printed by the artist himself with absolutely no machinery involved in the process. David uses aged cherry wood and a soft magnolia wood that helps deliver a natural and desired finish.

Print details:

• Hand-carved and hand printed from 17 blocks of wood
• Printed on beautiful Echizen hand-made paper. (Echizen is a small city near the Sea of Japan with a long tradition of paper making. Papermakers there were once given the honour of creating Japan’s paper currency from the start of the Meiji Restoration in 1868.)
• Individually stamped and signed by the artist
• Limited edition first printing, with only 200 prints made
• 16cm x 22.1cm (6.25″ x 8.75″ approx.)
• All prints come complete with a complimentary pre-cut mat border.
• For this print a dark blue mat border with a thickness of 2mm and a width of 41mm will be included in the shipment (frame not included).

Artist profile

Born in England, David Stones attended Lincoln College of Art studying printing and design. First visiting Japan in 1971, he returned in 1972 and discovered the world of woodblock prints.

With guidance from long-established print-maker Tomikichiro Tokuriki, of Kyoto, he began to produce his own small prints in Nagoya. Trial and error gave much experience. In 1983, his first solo show opened in the small city of Okazaki, near to where he had moved after renovating an abandoned farmhouse in the countryside where he still lives today with his wife Akiko.

*source: pbs.org