Butterflies

Butterflies belong to the kacho-e tradition of bird-and-flower subjects, but Sekino, working in the postwar sosaku-hanga movement, reframed such motifs away from the decorative refinement of Edo-period precedents toward something closer to modern still life or design study. A butterfly print by Sekino would typically present the insects as relatively large compositional elements against a flat or lightly textured ground, with the wing patterns rendered through carefully registered color blocks and the body and antennae described by the precise black keyline carved with knife and chisel into cherry or katsura wood. The grain of the block is often deliberately allowed to show through lighter passages, a hallmark of sosaku-hanga's interest in the materiality of woodcut. Within Sekino's wider output, dominated by portraits and meisho-e, the kacho-e prints function as concentrated exercises in pattern, color juxtaposition, and the rhythmic repetition of motif, consistent with his training under Onchi Koshiro and his engagement with Western modernist composition.