Untitled work by Karen Helga Maurstig

Another untitled sheet from the Mokumap series. Maurstig's working method in mokuhanga involves carving multiple blocks, typically of cherry or shina plywood, and printing them in sequence on dampened washi, building image and structure layer by layer. The Mokumap project foregrounds this layering as content: the sheet becomes legible as a map precisely because its construction mirrors how maps are made, by superimposing distinct strata of information. Bokashi gradations, achieved by brushing pigment unevenly onto the block before printing, can suggest depth, weather, or the indeterminate edge of a coastline. Based in Jølster, Maurstig draws on the Sunnfjord landscape (fjord water, granite, snow, low light) without rendering it descriptively. The series belongs to her broader practice across paper-based media, in which print, bookwork, and installation are treated as related ways of organizing surface and sequence.