Catalog (175)

In 1970 Japanese print maker Haku Maki (1921 – 2000) produced this large Wind image. It is 84c x 84 cm; 33 " x 33" . Provenance; Maki produced this print and this copy was sold to a Japanese buyer it stayed in Japan until it came to me last week in Beijing this is one of the few times I have been able to obtain a Maki print from Japan not through a dealer. When the previous owner decided to sell he did so through an auction in Japan; then it was fully restore in Tokyo and I acquired it. Because of its size it may be called Big Wind or even more poetically Diviner Wind. The main image shows a rounded not square stroke for the outer part of the image. Within this perimeter there are three black strokes to fill out the kanji for Wind Then Maki added his own touches --a large Yellow Sun and a quite small brown splash. This fairly complex set of stokes is balanced off by Maki’s seal of the day and a black kanji for Maaki’s surname. Maki did a number of big prints However he seems to have done less than ten prints this large Two known to me were done in 1973; if he did more I have still to find them. This print is 32/ 50. 33" x 33" last image is Poem woman

Maki's Emanation series may well have been 100 different images. This is an early one. It shows a young man ready to grope a woman’s breasts. Who is the man and who is the woman? Adam and Eve? Maki and his wife? Maki and another woman? It measures 16" x 16". Here I show images of the current emanation and single images of other prints in the Emanation series. The last frame is Emanation 100.

Work 73-12A is a firm and strong dragon not fierce not wimpy. The central kanji is offset by a small yellow Maki sun at the top left and a red splash on the right. They counterbalance each other and give color and verve to the whole print.

Haku Maki did many prints some with interesting backgrounds some not. This modest run of rather large pints had a special black background: it is the texture of old leather. . Maki created and used this technique only in 1981 prints and mainly in persimmons. The persimmons are plump and meaty the green leaves of the fruit are nicely proportioned. Maki did only a few twin persimmon prints and none after 1980 except this one. 81-10 is in frame 2. It is 12 x 18 inches 46 cm x 32 cm “The stem and leaf of the persimmon tree are done in raised glossy black urushi lacquer. “ The persimmon appears in autumn in Japan (and China) and is associated with that season The other one is 81 31 only one known to me gray leather like black. 81 32 We have added 81-10. A single persimmon with the distinctive gray background. I do not know the title of the print in frame 5 8110, 30 31 40 no number 32 white 50

persimmons galore. 81-3 added. * means I own it.

Two dragon year prints, in very very good condition,embossed blue, done in 1976, a year of the dragon. Haku Maki's dragon prints have nicely flowing kanji script We suspect he may have used the same mixed media implements to produce both prints. The blue one is 37/150. we have only seen one copy of each print: they must have all been snapped up by Year of the Dragon folk.

In 1960 Maki did the image shown. It is called Symbol. In all the years of collecting Maki prints and images I have never seen this one again. It is quite large but seems cluttered. Forty years later he did it as a print and a post card even as one friend has suggested he did the print before 1999, the date on the print. The seals are authentic not printed, and they are original Maki seals from well-used chops.

Poem 72-47 (road) 32 X 21.5 inches textured paper The sun is the inner part of the kanji for road. This is a very big and stunning Maki print It was done in 1972 at the height of his artistic powers. It depicts the kanji for Road or Way, e.g.the Way of Taoism (Daoism). As if done with a brush, the character whooshes across the well-textured paper. At the middle of the print, Maki has added a White Sun.

Haku Maki did a wide range of works: prints of many sizes, book plates, greeting cards, and postcards. Here are four postcards that he did in 1999. They are lithographs, each signed and with a Maki seal. They also appeared as prints at the same time. Haku Maki or his family produced them in the last year or so of his life.

In 1976 Haku Maki did three pairs of prints in which the black and white were reversed. One set is shown here. The cement blocks were used to print the white on black, then cleaned to do black on white. These were done in such themes as Mind Wind and Cloud. These are strong sweeping images in rather large prints. The two Wind images here are typical of the type. They are all about 15" x 20" and in editions of 150.

5.75 x 8.5 in. ai in Japanese The white background is punctuated by a yellow sun and a red splash --true Maki style. Frame 5 shows Sanae’s careful translation and explanation of this print – and her intuition as to what Maki-san may have meant when he created this image 41 years ago. Copyright 2012 Sanae Nakajima Chambers and Daniel Tretiak

Haku Maki was a prolific artist of modern Japanese prints in the second half of the 20th century. Many of his prints are known but quite a few remain unseen, even in the Internet age. The Emanation series was large: Maki probably produced more than 100 different prints in the series. At this advanced age, I have only seen about 30 of the Emanation prints—-and have only managed to acquire a few. In Emanation 65B Maki has produced a very colorful print: the red core is set off by the orange strips or slashes at the center of the print. The dramatic white signature in English in the left corner enhances the whole print. This signature may be seen as a kind of splash, which came to be an integral part of many Maki prints. The texture of the print is Maki’s traditional rough style set off by the black background. The main colors—-red, orange and yellow—-are as fresh and vibrant as they were nearly 50 years ago when Maki produced this print. The print has no formal seal. It is the only Maki print I have ever seen without his characteristic seal or chop. The print measures 40cm x 57cm (20.5in x 16in). It was done in the mid-1960s. Its title Emanation 65B does not tell us the year of production, rather that it was done in the middle of the long production period of the Emanation series. In Maki’s early years, the editions were small; this is 29/50. This print has had a good life: it was in the possession of a collector in Sweden who cared for it well—-and then it arrived here. Copyright 2012 by Daniel Tretiak The circle at the right could be the sun or a young child

In 1968 Haku Maki completed his Animal Song series. It was 12 different prints, one for each year of the Chinese/Japanese zodiac. Each print had the title Animal Song and the kanji for the animal, which was not translated. This print, Animal Song [dragon], 14/50, is a beautiful Maki red. The dragon of the image is a very traditional Chinese character for dragon. In this print Maki used the theme dragon for the first time. This dashing abstract kanji seems to almost swirl out of the paper. When sold the print was not in perfect condition: it was bought “laid down” and we carefully and successfully removed the backing, which was made of old industrial use wax paper. That paper protected the back for nearly 50 yeas, hence the lovely clean back. Maki produced this print for the Red Lantern Gallery in Kyoto, which sold it. Dragon 15 “ x 15”. Maki only used this dragon style in a greeting card he designed for the dragon year of 1976. Images above include the pristine back and the back as it arrived.

This print contains Japanese hieroglyphics not real kanji. It shows "rain" "day" and maybe a bird. It is 19.3x12.6cm.

Haku Maki Poem 71 92 - was done in 1971, one of the four years in which Maki did over 100 different prints. In 1971 he did about 5 Big prints – at least two sides are over 30 inches. In his total oeuvre he did 20+ big ones but only one Yellow This is it. It seems to be a single yellow stroke piercing the black; it is also the kanji for Mind in Maki’s mind. In mine it Is h Heart The big yellow stroke is set off by a yellow splash and a blue tear and a shimmering black sun (these are abstract parts of the kanji). The white ink signature at the left adds a nice final touch. It is a dramatic print, not soft. The single stroke may be seen as a meteor crashing through the black atmosphere targeting on Tokyo Beijing whichever. Size 30 ½"x15 ½" and edition 11/108; This print is spending the holidays getting restored in Oregon, after a challenging life in Florida – always hard for Maki prints, it will spend the Lunar New Year holidays in Beijing. Let a hundred flowers bloom Paul de Troy my Belgian colleague keeps me honest with trenchant criticism of my praise of Big Yellow. After examining my text he refers back to my research note 7 and the Big Reds. He wrote: “ I think his [Maki’s] best Big Reds are far more beautiful than this one. It has none of the energy of 70-72 or the elegance of 70-7 or the sensuality of 69-2 or the spontaneity of 69-5. none of the grace of woman 70-8. Big Yellow has none of that. I think it is a bit static in comparison. Not a comet streaking through the atmosphere. not too much passion. I don't know: I miss a kind of fluency for things like that. The title (Mind) suggests something else than energy or sensuality. This image rather breathes "Rest" to me. A rather peaceful state of mind. that's what it is to me. I'm beginning to like it, actually, because it's beginning to make sense. I can imagine it would make some impression, extending the human body, traveling beyond the practical world."

I call this set of images The Zodiac but Maki formally called them Animal Song + the animal name in kanji. The prints here are Animal Song. Red Lantern Gallery in Kyoto distributed them in 1968. In 1968 Haku Maki was commissioned by Red Lantern Gallery to produce the 12 animals of the Zodiac in a series entitled Animal Song. My Research Note 3 described the set briefly. This is an enhanced version. Maki did only 50 copies of each print; that was a normal run for him in that period. Over ten years I have only been able to see images of five prints. I own 4. Jennifer Britton owns the set. Her parents gave them to her. Within the past week I have been shown all 12. I am thrilled to post them here. I have not seen such a set and will not see one again. They were purchased in 1968 at the source and kept in a closet for many years. Jennifer Britton has kindly sent me photographs of the prints. The actual prints still hang in Ms. Britton’s home. They are all done in the best of Maki’s style: clear images, not necessarily simple ones, and very good colors. There are green and blue but also gray,teak and others. Please enjoy them. The image for Ox is really good. It shows two Chinese characters for Ox: one the design that Maki favored much of his life, the other I believe he only used once besides in this commentary. Each of the 12 images was done off the same cement block but changed for each image. The animals depicted are rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, ram, monkey, cock, dog, and boar. This 12-part series beats the socks off the great 22 images that Maki produced for the classic Festive Wine.

This Guest Research Note 1 is much ado about Nothing. The Maki print in question is 73-50A (Nothing). The essay is by David Bieling.

The third part of Note 10 looks at the prints Maki probably did in the 1969 to 1975 period but that, at the time of Dan Tretiak's writing this, had not yet come to light.