Landscape Aries

Landscape Aries belongs to Hodaka Yoshida's zodiac landscape group, a sequence in which astrological signs are translated into compositions of stacked geometric zones rather than literal figural emblems. Aries, the ram and the first sign of the zodiac, is typically evoked through directional forms — wedges, horns, advancing diagonals — set against banded grounds suggesting earth, sky, or sea. The print is built up through multiple woodblock impressions on [washi](/glossary/washi), each carrying a flat field of color registered against the next, with [bokashi](/glossary/bokashi) gradations softening selected edges. Hodaka often combined this hand-pulled mokuhanga base with photo-etched or stencilled elements in adjacent prints, but the zodiac landscapes generally remain pure woodblock, foregrounding the carved block's capacity for clean, architectural form. The work reflects his role as the family member who carried Yoshida printmaking furthest from his father Hiroshi's representational [meisho-e](/glossary/meisho-e), aligning the studio's craft tradition with the geometric abstraction current in 1960s and 1970s international printmaking.