Woodblock book Carmen

A bound woodblock book (mokuhansho) drawing on Georges Bizet's opera Carmen, this work belongs to Kawanishi's series of literary and theatrical book projects in which he illustrated narrative subjects across multiple sheets bound as an album. The Carmen theme allowed him to engage with Iberian and operatic imagery — bullfighters, Spanish dancers, and the figure of Carmen herself — refracted through his fauvist-influenced color sensibility. Such books occupied a particular niche in the [sosaku-hanga](/glossary/sosaku-hanga) movement: artists pursued the ehon tradition of illustrated Japanese books while applying the principle of jihitsu jiga jisaku (self-drawn, self-carved, self-printed). Kawanishi printed on [washi](/glossary/washi) using flat color blocks and minimal outline, letting bold chromatic juxtapositions rather than detailed modeling carry the image. The Carmen book reflects the openness to Western literary and musical sources that characterized Taisho and early Showa Japanese modernism, and it sits alongside his Circus book as evidence of his interest in cosmopolitan entertainment forms — fitting for an artist whose home city of Kobe functioned as a major international port.