Dogwood 9

Dogwood 9 is the ninth entry in Namiki's hanamizuki series, which extends his arboreal vocabulary to a tree introduced to Japan from North America in 1915 and now widely planted in gardens and along urban avenues. The print centers on the open, four-bract flowers of the dogwood arrayed across horizontal branches, a habit well suited to the flat, layered registrations of mokuhanga. Each color block is hand-carved and printed with water-based pigments on washi using the baren, with bokashi gradations carrying the background tone and lifting the pale bracts into relief. The choice of subject reflects Namiki's broader practice of isolating a single tree against a calm, atmospheric ground, here adapted to a flowering ornamental rather than the pines, cherries, and broadleaf forest specimens that dominate the Tree Scene series. Within the sosaku-hanga tradition, in which the artist is sole designer, carver, and printer, the numbered dogwood prints function as repeated meditations on the same species across light conditions and stages of bloom.