Catalog (175)

[NOTE: I think my late husband Daniel Tretiak wrote this in 2007, after he got this site up and running.] Daniel Tretiak has written a book, The Life and Works of Haku Maki, the important Japanese printmaker of the second half of the 20th Century. Maki toiled alone most of the time between 1960 and 2000. His output was substantial, most of it was cool, crisp, elegant. An example is shown above. I wrote about it: "The print in the center is the kanji for Me or I; it swooshes across the print, as if written with a big brush." It is Poem 71-25, done in 1971. It had an edition of 151. I own the print; I have only seen it offered once -- and I thought it was dramatic and beautiful then and still think so. As part of the print, Maki put his characteristic "splash", the yellow stroke which is part of yet a bit separate from the main image. Now we add eight more images of prints by Haku Maki. They are all in the book and are all beautiful prints. The cover will be selected from these and the one that has been here for quite a while. Which one do you think will be the cover? Here is a list of the images by year and number in the edition. (Note: this listing and the order of the images is still not perfect; this is a work in progress, sorry.) 1968 Zodiac Animal Song Monkey 11/50; 1969 Dance 4 96/105; 1970 Poem 71-25 (Me) 91/100; 1970 Poem 70-84 140/152; 1971 Poem 72-6 17/201; 1978 Collection 16 125/205; 1988 Z-1 Persimmon 18/100; and 1995 Zen 3-B 7/27; Like the first image on this site: a good Maki print draws the eye toward the center, there is little clutter between the outer margin and the image depicted. Maki's most well-known work may have been the illustrations he did for the translated volume, Festive Wine. But he did much more. His work was done in a modern way in a modern era -- yet it was based on many very traditional concepts (ancient and early kanji, ceramics, persimmons, and the like). His work is carefully discussed in this book. This site is a work in progress, many things will change in the coming weeks. Note: Text and images all covered by Copyright; use of them requires the expressed written permission of Daniel Tretiak, author of this book.

Daniel Tretiak, after publishing his book The Life and Works of Haku Maki in 2007, found that he had more to say about prints as they came into his life. And so, from time to time, he wrote Research Notes and published them on this site. For Note 1, he wrote the following: This is a collage of Maki prints depicting the tokkuri (sake bottle). We have added images of most of the prints here. Enjoy. Be Sure to CLICK Above as directed, please.

Daniel Tretiak, after publishing his book The Life and Works of Haku Maki in 2007, found that he had more to say about prints as they came into his life. And so he wrote Research Notes and published them on this site.

78-2 (Water) In 1978 Haku Maki was nearing the end of his artistic effort using kanji (Chinese characters) as the main theme of his work. This print is one bold kanji, for Water. To make it easier for his gaijin admirers to know what it meant, he wrote "water' in the bottom margin. The effect if the print is bold, the character stretches across the paper; it has a gold Sun (akin to a splash for accent and decoration, near the center of the print), and the characteristic Maki seal in the lower right area. This is 183/203., This image appeared around the same time as other large, single character ones: Mountain, Bamboo, Flavor and Heart, etc. This print is in what one might call a medium size: Length is 17 ", width about 9-1/2 ". Shortly after, Maki did Water as a large print, roughly 16" x 32". The condition is very good, not perfect. There is a little foxing on the front please write to me for any questions. During his lifetime, 1924 to 2000, Maki did well over 2000 images, making him one of Japan's most prolific print makers. He was also very good. His prints are clear, deceptively simple, standout, very Japanese but not representational.

Flower Song 3 In the Mid-60s Maki did a set of ten different images, entitled Flower Song This is Flower Song 3. It is a very abstract print: it is probably not kanji (Chinese characters); it is similar to prints entitled, say Dance. It could be the character for woman: at the left there may also be the kanji for woman (oona) with a single stroke perhaps penetrating the woman -- but is probably not. The Flower Song images are rare, and when available often either in poor condition or costly. This print is in good but sadly not in pristine condition. The front is fine, the back has a bit of foxing. Still striking image. One Dance images appears in my book, The Life and Works of Haku Maki "Dance 4", p. 37. It was Maki's style to punctuate a print with a splash or as in this case, with a Big Yellow Sun, at the top right. The swaths that make up the print look as if they were done by a big Japanese brush. Whooowh. I date this to having been done in the mid to late 1960s.

I call this set of images The Zodiac but Maki formally called this Animal Song + the animal name. The actual prints here are Animal Song - Monkey Dog Snake and Dragon. Each print came in an edition of 50 copies. Red Lantern Gallery in Kyoto distributed them. 1968.

This note is the fourth in the series of Research Notes.

This is a quite large Maki Persimmon print This is Work 74-67 Haku Maki did prints with Persimmon as a main theme from the early 1970s for well over a decade. This is a fairly large image: it shows one persimmon growing out from the tree, with leaves coming off the branch. The leaves are very clear: they have been tipped with shellac so they look very shiny . This is 43/154, here Maki used ink the color of the persimmon when putting his seal on the print. To the best of my knowledge this is only the second copy of this print I have seen in more than ten years. It was not treated well at the beginning of its life: a framing company put tape on it man-years ago and the tape remnants cannot be removed. They are shown in the images of the back. Otherwise condition is very good, the persimmon is clean front and back and the front is clean. Tape remnants on the front

In 1968 and 69 Haku Maki produced Poem 5 for Festive Wine. That image was a paradigm of clarity as to what the kanji or Woman ought to look like. It was a smooth svelte character. Yet at this same time, he also did this print, a tall gangly woman. It is Poem 69-50. She looks as if she is askelter, not all “together”. Or is the left leg longer than the right one? The print itself is done in the Maki manner: Size 10.5 “ x 10.5”. Maki used splashes on his prints to give dynamism to the field: sometimes just one, sometimes two. Here: a yellow and red splash and a Maki seal.

This note is the fifth in Daniel Tretiak's series of research notes.

The striking kanji means Rising. Maki produced this image in 1970 as a modest black on white print. This print is Poem 70- 48 (rising): The kanji,which is the print's core theme, is reiterated in the title. When this print first came out, it must have in a winner: 59/151 . This print has a golden yellow sun and a light blue tear or splash to give it verve. This is the Maki style. A year later in 1971 Maki produced a Big Red, the same character shown here was done as a Red kanji in striking image. Poem 71-50.

Haku Maki was an important Japanese modern print maker of the second half of the 20th Century. In the 1970s his work consisted of many abstract images of Chinese characters, kanji. Most are quickly recognizable by Chinese and Japanese. This one has befuddled and even annoyed some Asians who normally like Maki kanji. Here Maki is "in your face" a bit with a strong kanji that was translated into English, Nothing, by the artist Good friends like variations of this kanji: please open the link fully to see other Nothings.

Poem 70-72. This striking Maki Big Red has had a long history for being just 40 years old. It has seen the world and is now back in Asia, in Beijing. This is as near to Tokyo, where it was created by Maki, that it has been in many years. In this case, the big red letter is the hiragana "chi" ‚¿ or shiru, which means to know, find out, to learn, or have knowledge. This is a wonderful sweeping red stroke (actually two strokes) which whooshes across the black background like a meteor or comet streaking through the night. As knowledge cuts through ignorance perhaps. The cement was deeply incised to create the print. Maki normally used kanji in his prints; this is a rare case in which he used hiragana The red hiragana in the center is set off by a black Sun and a blue or purple splash to put a little color in the back sky. Size 24” x 17”. This print shows a rare use of hiragana by Maki. 41/106 Copyright by Daniel Tretiak

This Maki Big Red has the Kanji (Chinese character) for Flower as its theme. The Flower is red and strong; it is set off by a black Sun to the right. A blue tear balances the sun on the left. Maki’s seal in red ink paste, is below the tear, also at the left. Although Maki himself printed this image, the ink looks as if it was layered on by hand. This is 133/154; Print size is about 11” x 18”. We note: the paper in this print is smooth, it does not have the moon-surface effect. In 1969 and running just through 1974, Maki did a series of these bold Big Red prints. He did at most 15 Big Reds. One friend has asked did he do Big images in other colors. He only did a smattering in Blue and Green.

A diptych of Maki prints, one done in 1968 and the other in 1969. In the best of Maki's spartan austere style, they are Poem 68-40 and Poem 69-13.

Haku Maki produced this “pair” of prints in 1968. The first image is Child. This is the first time Maki produced an image with Child as a theme. Poem 68-52. The second one is his kanji for Water. Poem 68-53. This image was used again in the set of 21 prints he produced for Festive Wine, which was issued in 1969. The colors in both are strikingly beautiful in these images – as they also are as prints. Maki signed each in white ink, something he rarely did. Both prints have had hard lives, they were actually folded. Now they have been wonderfully restored.

In 1968 Haku Maki produced this large Blue image of Child. The blue is vivid and the yellow face is in sharp contrast. To the far right is a small Green Child, the same theme, different key color. It appeared in 1969. The red image is a trial run for a Festive Wine print. It never made it. The translators of Festive Wine or Anne Brannen nixed it and used a different Child image, the fifth frame. It might appear that the block used to produce all thee was the same; however, the Blue image is considerably larger than that used for the red and green ones. Blue one is Poem 68-53 12.26" x 16.25"

Haku Maki (1924 to 2000) was an important late 20th Century Japanese printmaker. He created images often using kanji (originally: Chinese characters) as the theme for his prints. He created about 2000 different images. Many are known. Here I present a number of images which I had never seen until this year even as I have gathered many. I still lack the image for Autumn in this series: any assistance in finding it would be most appreciated winter was formerly in the John and Joyce Meyer Collection in Seattle. The last image is of a 1972 Maki rendering of all four seasons.