Hair, LE

Hair — a woman's black hair, arranged or falling loose — was a subject with deep roots in Japanese aesthetics, where it carried associations of femininity, beauty, and the careful ritual of grooming. Kawano's Hair print likely presents a close view of a figure defined primarily by the flow and mass of her hair, the dark ink of the woodblock particularly well suited to rendering its lustrous weight. The limited edition format indicates this was among his compositions most carefully controlled for distribution.