Wave and Pine

Wave and pine (matsu) are paired motifs with deep roots in Japanese visual culture — the pine signifying longevity and endurance, the wave its restless counterpart, together forming a coastal vocabulary that runs from byōbu screen painting through Edo-period meisho-e. Kojima translates this tradition into lithography, working in her customary black on warm cream, where the linear demands of pine needles and the curling crest of a wave both suit the medium's affinity for finely drawn line. The composition likely places the gnarled trunk and angular needle clusters of a shore pine against the rhythmic pattern of cresting water, a pairing she handles in flat planes rather than the layered registration of nishiki-e. Within her broader output — which more often pairs contemporary women with traditional motifs like hawks, peonies, and plum blossom — this seascape sits among the more austere nature studies, reducing her design vocabulary to two emblematic forms held in measured opposition.