Pick of the Bunch

"Pick of the Bunch" depicts a still-life arrangement, most likely a selection of flowers or fruit gathered as a group set apart from a larger set — the title implies discrimination among many. Executed in mokuhanga, the print carries the tonal characteristics of water-based pigments worked into dampened washi with a baren: soft saturation in the figure, an absence of mechanical edge, and the likely use of bokashi gradations across petals, leaves, or skins. Mokuhanga suits botanical still life because its translucent layered colors register the structure of organic forms without the harder graphic line of oil-based relief or linocut. For Grey, this 2020 work belongs to a body of mokuhanga produced alongside her etching, aquatint, and linocut output at Graphic Studio Dublin, where she has pursued printmaking since retiring from primary teaching in 2005. The still-life subject reflects observational disciplines she trained in across NCAD, IADT, and the National Gallery of Ireland — drawing and watercolour practice translated into the slower, registration-driven process of Japanese woodblock.