For Thee-N, Shinoda Tōkō

Archive Label date unknown:
Internationally famous, Shinoda Tōkō is one of the most important artists to emerge in Japan after World War II. She began as a traditional painter in brush and ink and then turned to lithography, a medium rarely used by Japanese artists. In remarkable fashion, she transmits the energy and subtlety of the Japanese brush to the lithography plate, upon which she directly creates her sweeping brushstrokes. Each print then becomes a dramatic record of her original gestures, as well as a contemporary abstract image.

Archive Label date unknown:
Shinoda began as a traditional Japanese calligrapher using brush and ink, but then turned to more abstract forms of painting and lithography. Her origins are evident in both of these prints. In For Thee N, bold calligraphic strokes forcefully race from left to right, gracefully balanced by wispy gold and green highlights. Shinoda loves to experiment with contrasting textures, colors, and negative/positive spaces-- as in Verse G where shimmering translucent shapes and lines have been juxtaposed against a dense black background.