Boys and Kites

Created in 1912, this color woodcut captures boys flying kites, a subject drawn from the everyday life Lum observed during her extended stays in Japan. Kite flying held cultural significance beyond simple play — certain festivals featured elaborate kites as ceremonial objects, and boys' kite competitions were a spring tradition. Lum renders the scene with the flat color areas and bold outlines she absorbed from Japanese printmaking, but her compositional sensibility retains a Western eye for narrative detail. The upward movement of kites against sky creates a dynamic vertical energy, while the grounded figures of the boys anchor the composition below. The 1912 date places this among a productive cluster of prints Lum made during her second extended stay in Japan, when her command of the medium had fully matured.