Untitled (Abe-Takano 04)

The fourth print in the Abe-Takano series, this intaglio extends the duo's body of work as part of a sustained collaborative output. Intaglio printing in Japan, while less identified internationally with the country's print tradition than the woodblock idioms of nishiki-e and shin hanga, has been a substantial strand of contemporary practice since the postwar period, with university programs at Aichi, Tama, and Kyoto Seika sustaining it. The decision to issue prints in an untitled, numbered sequence is consistent with values that contemporary printmakers inherit from the sosaku-hanga (creative print) movement of the early twentieth century, in which the artist's hand is responsible for the entire process — drawing, plate preparation, biting, wiping, and printing — and the work is presented on its own terms rather than as illustration of an external subject. Each sheet in such a run carries the individuating marks of impression: slight differences in plate tone, the wear of any drypoint passages, and the registration of multiple plates where they are employed.