Seven Warring States of Zhou Dynasty China: Swallow

"Swallow" renders Yan (燕), one of the seven major states that contended for supremacy during the Warring States period (475–221 BCE) of late Zhou-dynasty China. Shiraga produced this silkscreen as part of a numbered series dedicated to those states, drawing on his sustained engagement with Chinese classical literature and history, a register that became increasingly visible in his titles after 1971, when he took Tendai Buddhist vows at Enryaku-ji on Mount Hiei. The print translates the trajectory of his foot-painting gesture into flat planes of saturated color, retaining the directional sweep of pigment driven by the artist's body weight while losing the impasto materiality of the oil-on-canvas originals. The series belongs to the late chapter of his Gutai-era practice in which the same physical gesture was systematically extended across multiple media.