Japanese tea ceremony

This print depicts chanoyu, the formal Japanese tea ceremony, likely showing a host in kimono preparing matcha within a chashitsu, with the kama (kettle), chawan (tea bowl), and chasen (bamboo whisk) arranged on tatami. Wada's compositional approach to interior subjects typically favors a low viewpoint and flattened perspective that echoes the spatial conventions of the tea room itself, where guests sit at floor level. The mokuhanga is likely printed in restrained earthy tones — kuwacha browns, moss greens, and the muted greys of fired raku ceramics — with bokashi gradations reserved for tatami edges or shoji screens. As a documentary printmaker, Wada treats the tea ceremony not as antique subject but as a living practice, paralleling his approach to working trades in the Showa Shokugyo Emaki. The print situates ritual hospitality within the same observational framework he applied to welders and stonemasons: dignified, specific, and grounded in the physical gestures of skilled hands.