The Seacoast in Autumn

This 2008 landscape shifts from the river series to the seacoast, a subject with deep roots in Japanese printmaking from Hokusai's coastal views to the meisho-e landscapes of Hiroshige. An autumn seacoast composition typically balances the cool blue-gray of the ocean against the warm ochres and rusts of turning coastal vegetation or cliffs. Bull's technical approach would employ bokashi to render the transitional sky and water surfaces, with the color cooling toward the horizon through progressive pigment gradation. Washi absorbs the water-based pigments to produce the characteristic soft luminosity of mokuhanga, distinct from Western intaglio or lithographic prints. The seasonal pairing of this print with the seacoast spring, summer, and winter compositions suggests a systematic exploration of a single coastal site across changing light conditions and atmospheric moods, a format with clear precedents in the Meiji landscape tradition.