Blue Space

Blue Space announces its concern through its title: an exploration of a single chromatic field and the spatial reading it produces. Mokuhanga is well suited to this kind of monochromatic or near-monochromatic investigation, since the pigment is absorbed into the [washi](/glossary/washi) rather than sitting on its surface, giving a body to flat planes of color that flat-stock printing methods cannot match. [Bokashi](/glossary/bokashi) gradients allow a single hue to shift in density across the sheet, and overprinting from successive blocks can deepen a blue without introducing additional colors. Sawada's work circulates among collectors of late-twentieth-century Japanese hanga, and a print titled in English on a color-field theme is consistent with the post-sosaku and abstract mokuhanga production sold through hangaten exhibition venues during that period. Without a date on this particular sheet, Blue Space cannot be placed precisely within his sequence, though its title and approach align with the dated late-1980s and 1990 prints in his documented corpus.