Cathy Hull

A portrait study from Andrea G. Artz's ongoing series translating photographic likeness into mokuhanga, Cathy Hull renders an individual sitter through the water-based woodblock tradition. Working from a photographic source, Artz separates tonal information across multiple blocks, with [bokashi](/glossary/bokashi) gradations carrying the soft modulations of skin and shadow that a single keyblock outline could not. The print sits on absorbent [washi](/glossary/washi), the [baren](/glossary/baren)-burnished pigment settling into the fibres rather than resting on the surface, producing the characteristic matte luminosity of [nishiki-e](/glossary/nishiki-e) portraiture rather than the gloss of a photographic print. As with the broader body of work that has emerged from Artz's MFA research at the University of Leeds, the image foregrounds the question of how a sitter's presence survives the migration from camera sensor to carved cherrywood. The named-sitter format aligns the series with the long history of portrait printmaking while declining the iconographic shortcuts of [bijin-ga](/glossary/bijin-ga), locating each subject as a specific contemporary individual rather than a type.