IMC 2024 Echizen submission

This print was created by Carmen Wagenblast for the International Mokuhanga Conference (IMC) 2024, held in Echizen, Fukui Prefecture — a region historically associated with the production of fine [washi](/glossary/washi) paper used in traditional Japanese woodblock printing. Submissions to the IMC exchange portfolios are typically printed on Echizen [kozo](/glossary/kozo) paper supplied to participants, allowing the conference to function as both a technical showcase and a unifying material gesture across the international mokuhanga community. As with much of Wagenblast's mokuhanga practice, the work reflects the European appropriation of the technique, drawing on water-based pigments applied with the [baren](/glossary/baren) and registered through [kento](/glossary/kento) marks. The IMC submission format encourages experimentation with [bokashi](/glossary/bokashi) gradations, layered transparencies, and limited block counts, since each artist must produce an edition large enough to distribute among fellow conference participants. Within Wagenblast's broader practice, this print situates her among the contemporary German cohort that has embraced mokuhanga as an environmentally restrained alternative to solvent-based European relief printing, contributing to the ongoing dialogue between Edo-period methodology and present-day continental European printmaking.