2024 spitzack Extraterrestrial dreaming woodcut woodblock mokuhanga seattle art artist print printmaking

This 2024 print departs from the natural and urban subjects that populate much of Spitzack's catalog, instead venturing into surreal territory. The title 'Extraterrestrial dreaming' suggests a composition built around dream imagery and otherworldly forms — a subject category virtually unknown in classical mokuhanga, which historically depicted observed reality through [bijin-ga](/glossary/bijin-ga), [meisho-e](/glossary/meisho-e), and [kacho-e](/glossary/kacho-e) conventions. The mokuhanga technique, with its layered transparencies and capacity for soft [bokashi](/glossary/bokashi) gradations, lends itself to the atmospheric ambiguity such subject matter requires. Water-based pigments on [washi](/glossary/washi) can produce ethereal color washes that oil-based relief printing cannot replicate. Spitzack's willingness to extend the medium toward science fiction and dream states reflects the experimental orientation of the contemporary American mokuhanga community, where the technique has been embraced precisely because its visual language remains open to subjects that would have been unthinkable in the Edo period. The 2024 date situates the print within the body of work recognized at the International Mokuhanga Conference in Echizen.