Garden In perspective

"Garden In perspective" returns Sasajima to his enduring concern with temple precincts, here in the form of one of the cultivated landscapes — likely a karesansui dry-stone garden or an arranged stroll garden of a Nara or Kyoto monastery. The titular emphasis on perspective suggests a directed spatial composition, perhaps a corridor view from veranda to rear wall, the kind of long sightline that the Zen gardens of Daitoku-ji and Ryoan-ji invite. Sasajima approached such subjects with the engraver's discipline he learned from Onchi Koshiro, every block designed, carved, and printed by his own hand. The treatment likely emphasizes tonal contrast over gradient: stones, gravel furrows, moss, pruned pine, and timber framing reduced to bold passages of black and unprinted washi, with karazuri embossing occasionally suggesting the relief of stone or timber without ink. The print extends the same architectural attention he brought to Todai-ji, Horyu-ji, and other temple buildings outward into their gardens.