Kawabata Chie

Kawabata Chie is a Japanese woodcut printmaker who achieved the highest honor at the 2021 Awagami International Miniature Print Exhibition, winning the Grand Prize for her water-based woodcut 'Backstroke.' The work, printed using the traditional baren technique with water-based inks, demonstrated the kind of technical command and creative vision that the AIMPE jury reserves for its top award.

Working within the mokuhanga tradition of water-based woodblock printing, Kawabata employs the baren -- the hand-held rubbing disc that is the defining tool of Japanese printmaking -- to transfer ink from carved woodblocks to paper. Her choice of water-based inks over oil-based alternatives places her firmly within the centuries-old Japanese lineage of woodblock printing, where the interaction between water, pigment, wood grain, and absorbent washi paper produces effects impossible to achieve through any other printing method.

The title 'Backstroke' suggests a figurative sensibility -- the image of a swimmer seen from a perspective that captures both the figure and the water's surface, a subject that demands the kind of fluid, translucent layering at which water-based woodcut excels. The miniature format of the AIMPE competition adds an additional technical challenge, requiring the artist to concentrate her vision into an intimate scale while maintaining the freshness and vitality of the printed mark.

Kawabata's Grand Prize at AIMPE 2021 places her among the most accomplished practitioners in the international miniature print field, where she competed against entries from printmakers worldwide working in every technique from etching and lithography to digital and mixed media processes.