Man in Armor No. 12

Man in Armor No. 12 (1962) belongs to Hagiwara's early series of warrior figures, in which traditional Japanese armor — lacquered plates, laced cords, crested helmet — was treated as an abstract formal system as much as a historical subject. The armor's overlapping plates and complex surface patterns provided his carved woodblock with material ideally suited to his investigation of texture and layered structure. The warrior series placed him in dialogue with the long tradition of Japanese warrior art while using the sosaku-hanga medium's freedom to push toward abstraction.