Maiko

Another in Sekino's extended series of maiko portraits, this print continues his engagement with Kyoto's geisha district, where the apprentice's distinctive coiffure, painted face, and long-sleeved furisode provided a vocabulary he reworked across many compositions. The image likely centers a single standing or seated figure, with the surrounding ground reduced to a flat color field that throws the kimono and ornaments into relief. Technically, Sekino combines carved keyblock contour, thick [washi](/glossary/washi) paper, and multiple color blocks pulled with a [baren](/glossary/baren), occasionally allowing wood grain to read through paler passages — a feature consistent with [sosaku-hanga](/glossary/sosaku-hanga) values of material honesty. The repetition of subject across his maiko prints is less serial in the marketing sense than meditative, each impression reframing the same iconographic type to register slight shifts in stance, expression, or the painterly weight of color.