Iris No 72 — 花菖蒲 No 72

Entry seventy-two in Sugiura Kazutoshi's iris series is a companion piece to its immediate predecessor, likely produced in close succession and sharing many of the same compositional decisions while differing in chromatic emphasis or the precise arrangement of blooms and leaves. Sugiura's practice of working in pairs or clusters within the larger numbered series allowed him to explore how small changes in a composition — a slightly different angle on the bloom, a different quality of light — could produce dramatically different emotional effects. These pairs reward side-by-side comparison.