Untitled

Pittman's untitled mokuhanga print exemplifies a strand of contemporary practice in which the language of the medium itself — registered impressions, layered transparencies, and the visible tooth of washi — carries the work without recourse to titled imagery. Mokuhanga's technical vocabulary, including [bokashi](/glossary/bokashi) for graduated tone and the characteristic mark of the baren on dampened paper, gives the artist a defined set of expressive variables. Working without titles aligns Pittman with a generation of North American printmakers who have approached the technique through the lens of studio abstraction rather than the figurative subjects ([yakusha-e](/glossary/yakusha-e), [bijin-ga](/glossary/bijin-ga), [kacho-e](/glossary/kacho-e)) that defined the historical [ukiyo-e](/glossary/ukiyo-e) schools. The artist's participation in the International Mokuhanga Conference Americas 2024 exhibition documents the continued international circulation of the technique, and her inclusion in the juried selection situates this print among works that the IMC organizers identified as representative of current practice in the Americas.