Janet Wilson

Janet Wilson is one of Artz's mokuhanga portraits, produced through the Japanese water-based woodblock technique she has developed as an extension of her photographic practice. The print is built from a sequence of carved blocks, each inked with water-based pigment and printed by hand onto [washi](/glossary/washi) — the long-fibred Japanese paper that absorbs and holds the colour without warping. Washi's surface gives mokuhanga its characteristic matte depth, distinct from the gloss of a silver gelatin or inkjet print. The portrait likely depicts the sitter in a measured frontal pose drawn from Artz's photographs, with [bokashi](/glossary/bokashi) gradients modelling the face and background. Working in editions rather than as unique objects, Artz uses the multiplicity of print to mirror photography's reproducibility while introducing the material variation that hand-printing always carries. The work belongs to a wider London mokuhanga practice that has grown around the technique over the past two decades.