Untitled

This untitled mokuhanga print foregrounds the specific material qualities of Alex Mankiewicz's medium. Mokuhanga differs from Western relief printing in fundamental ways: the pigments are water-based, the paper is dampened before printing, and the impression is taken by hand with a [baren](/glossary/baren) rather than through a press. These conditions produce a particular surface — pigment absorbed into the fibers of the [washi](/glossary/washi) rather than sitting on top, edges that can be either crisp or softened by [bokashi](/glossary/bokashi), and registration achieved through carved kentō marks rather than mechanical alignment. Mankiewicz, who trained in Kyoto before establishing a practice that now spans Japan and Australia, works within these constraints as a contemporary graphic artist rather than a copyist of historical styles. His prints draw on the technical inheritance of [nishiki-e](/glossary/nishiki-e) — the multi-block color print developed in eighteenth-century Edo — while applying it to imagery that belongs to contemporary illustration. The print operates in two registers at once: a traditional process applied to contemporary graphic ends.