Buzz

羽音 (haoto) denotes the sound of wings beating — a bee, a butterfly, a moth, or a swarm just out of frame. Given Takeda's recurring insect subjects (butterflies and ladybugs are noted throughout her career), the print most likely centers on a single insect either alighted on, or in close approach to, a plant element rather than a wider landscape. Rendering a buzzing wing in still copperplate intaglio is largely a problem of edge: drypoint leaves a furred burr at the wing margin that reads as motion, and a soft-bitten aquatint adjacent to it can suggest the disturbed air immediately around it. Etched line carries the body and antennae cleanly. The chine-collé sheet typical of her impressions lends the wing tissue a subtle translucency that opaque paper would deny. Buzz dates to the same year as Waterlily and continues her practice of taking a single small natural subject and treating it at the meticulous scale her plates permit. Editions of this period stand at thirty impressions.