September - autumn rain

Part of a calendar or seasonal series structured around the twelve months, this September sheet pairs the autumn rain motif with foliage beginning to turn. Sekino approaches the subject through the sosaku-hanga principle of self-carving and self-printing, meaning the rendering of falling rain — whether as incised lines drawn directly into the block or as overlaid bokashi gradations — carries the artist's hand throughout. Compositionally, prints in this format typically combine flat color fields for ground or sky with patterned passages of leaves, allowing the diagonal of the rain to unify the design. The restrained palette of muted earths, ochres, and greys characteristic of Sekino's mid-career work suits the damp, overcast subject. The print belongs to the broader twentieth-century revival of meisho and seasonal imagery within the creative-prints movement, where artists reinterpreted traditional subjects through modern abstraction rather than the narrative detail of the Edo masters.