Carlo Petrosino

The portrait of Carlo Petrosino sits within Andrea G. Artz's mokuhanga practice, in which the centuries-old Japanese water-based woodblock technique is used to render contemporary sitters drawn from photographic source material. Mokuhanga, historically associated with Edo-period genres such as [bijin-ga](/glossary/bijin-ga) and [yakusha-e](/glossary/yakusha-e), is here applied to portraiture without performative or theatrical framing—each named sitter is treated as an individual study rather than as a type. The technical sequence remains continuous with traditional practice: source imagery is separated into color and tonal layers, blocks are carved for each, and impressions are registered using kentō and pulled by hand with a [baren](/glossary/baren) onto [washi](/glossary/washi). The result is a portrait that carries both the visual logic of photography and the material signature of woodblock printing. Artz, whose interdisciplinary practice also includes installation, collage, and three-dimensional paper sculpture, treats the print medium as one component of a broader engagement with the human figure and its translation across formats and materials.