Winter composition No. 2

A winter print that may be the same composition as "Winter composition 2" under a variant transliteration, or a separate edition within Iwami's larger winter sequence. Either way the vocabulary is consistent: restricted palette, deep embossing, and selective application of silver or aluminum leaf to suggest cold light or the surface of frozen water. Iwami often produced variations on a winter motif across years, allowing her to test how a single block configuration registered against different paper weights, leaf placements, or pigment dilutions. The print likely depends on raking light as much as on pigment for its full reading, with embossed passages catching shadow that flat reproduction cannot capture. Numbered titles also reflect her interest in sequence and revision rather than single definitive images. The [sosaku-hanga](/glossary/sosaku-hanga) movement, founded on the principle that the artist must conceive, carve, and print, gave Iwami the framework for this kind of sustained material investigation across decades.