$500–$3,000. Common prints: $500–$1,000. Key value factors: Okamoto's colorful landscape prints are modestly priced and accessible to beginning collectors.
White Fox Sisters depicts a pair of kitsune, the fox spirits deeply embedded in Japanese folk religion and storytelling. The title suggests a familial bond between the two foxes, adding emotional warmth to the supernatural subject. In Japanese folklore, foxes live in complex social structures and form attachments that mirror human relationships, sometimes even marrying humans and bearing children. Okamoto renders this sisterly pair in the [oban](/glossary/oban) woodblock format, using his hand-carved blocks to define the white foxes against a colored ground. The [sosaku-hanga](/glossary/sosaku-hanga) technique allows Okamoto to control every nuance of the printing process, adjusting ink saturation and paper moisture to achieve the luminous quality of white fur that his fox subjects demand. The paired composition creates a sense of intimacy and mutual awareness between the two figures.
Hebizukai
1932
Color woodblock print; oban
1935
Color woodblock print; oban
1964
Acrylic paint and oil pastel with oiled charcoal and ink over an ink and graphite underdrawing on paper
1964
Color lithograph with relief block and hand coloring; edition 35/36
White Fox Sisters was created by Ryusei Okamoto (岡本隆生).
White Fox Sisters depicts animals.
