No.7

One of Toshi Yoshida's numbered abstract prints from his post-1952 modernist phase, when he set aside the representational landscape vocabulary of the Yoshida studio to explore non-objective composition. The numerical title indicates a sequenced exploration rather than a depictive subject, a labeling convention shared by other postwar Japanese abstract printmakers including Onchi Koshiro and Saito Kiyoshi. The print likely combines flat color fields cut from multiple blocks with textured passages exploiting cherry-wood grain, all pulled by hand with a baren on washi. Toshi's abstract output ran in parallel with his ongoing landscape and wildlife work, demonstrating his fluency in two distinct modes of mokuhanga. These numbered abstracts were typically issued in smaller editions than his representational prints and tested formal questions about color relationships and the printed surface, situating Toshi within the broader sosaku-hanga conversation of his generation while preserving the craft standards of the Shimoochiai studio.