Eve

Eve alone — without Adam, without the serpent, in the moment before or after the temptation — is an unusual choice for an independent subject. Watanabe's katazome rendering of Eve focuses attention on the first woman's own integrity: not as Adam's companion or the Fall's agent, but as a figure of primordial humanity, her presence in the garden given the same bold, earthy visual language as all his Biblical figures. The stencil's flat color renders her with the same dignity as any of his male subjects.