Qin Yue

Qin Yue is a portrait print by Andrea G. Artz, made in mokuhanga — Japanese water-based woodblock printing on [washi](/glossary/washi). The image is derived from a photograph, separated into colour layers and carved across multiple blocks, then printed in sequence with water-based pigments and a [baren](/glossary/baren), with kentō registration cuts aligning each impression. The result is a likeness rendered in the flat, slightly absorbed colour fields characteristic of the medium, with the grain of the wood subtly carried through into the surface of the sheet. The reduction of a photographic portrait to a small number of carved layers means decisions about emphasis — which contours to retain, where to allow [bokashi](/glossary/bokashi) gradation, where to leave the paper untouched — are made by hand rather than by camera. Artz's wider practice uses such prints alongside folded three-dimensional photographic portraits, sculpture and installation, all centred on the human figure and its presence in space. Qin Yue belongs to this portrait body of work, holding a single sitter in the analogue register of mokuhanga.