rainier square tower Minoru Yamasaki architecture spitzack woodblock woodcut mokuhanga print printmaking washi seattle art

This print depicts Rainier Square Tower, the Seattle skyscraper completed in 2020 on a site originally developed by Minoru Yamasaki, whose 1977 Rainier Tower famously tapered toward its base. Spitzack treats the building as a geometric study, likely flattening its faceted curtain wall into hard-edged planes that the woodblock medium handles well — crisp registration along straight key blocks, with subtle bokashi or flat color blocks distinguishing one facade from another. Mokuhanga's water-based pigments produce a matte, papery quality that suits architectural subjects, lending mass without the gloss of oil-based relief printing. The composition belongs to a meisho-e lineage updated for the contemporary city: where Hiroshige's Edo views catalogued bridges and gates, Spitzack catalogues Seattle's vertical landmarks. The Geometric tag reflects an emphasis on planar abstraction over picturesque rendering. Within his wider body of work, this print sits alongside other Seattle architectural studies, and reflects the American mokuhanga movement's interest in extending traditional Japanese formats to local urban subjects without resorting to pastiche.