Iris No 44 — 花菖蒲 No 44

The forty-fourth iris in Sugiura Kazutoshi's numbered series was produced early enough in the project that the fundamental compositional decisions are still being explored rather than refined. The hana-shōbu at No. 44 shows the artist working through questions of scale — how large should the flower be relative to the pictorial field? — and orientation — should the iris be shown at eye level, from above, or from below? — that would eventually be resolved into the more confident solutions of the later numbered entries. The layered silkscreen technique is already firmly established as the printmaker's primary tool.