IMC 2024 Echizen submission

The title indicates this print was prepared for the International Mokuhanga Conference (IMC) 2024, with "Echizen" referencing the [washi](/glossary/washi) paper tradition of Fukui Prefecture. The triennial IMC gathers water-based woodblock practitioners from across the world, and its print exchanges and exhibitions typically invite participants to respond to a regional material or theme — Echizen washi, with its long [kozo](/glossary/kozo) fibers, dimensional stability under repeated dampening, and capacity to receive pigment cleanly across multiple impressions, is a natural substrate for such a submission. As a contemporary mokuhanga work, the sheet would have been produced from hand-cut blocks using water-based pigments, nori paste, and a [baren](/glossary/baren), with registration achieved through [kento](/glossary/kento) marks. Strand's wider practice is shaped by her doctoral research at Akademia Sztuk Pieknych in Krakow, which positioned mokuhanga at the intersection of studio practice and academic inquiry; her participation in IMC exchanges reflects an ongoing engagement with the international community of practitioners that has formed around the medium outside Japan over the past two decades.