Yoshida Hodaka

Woodblock Prints

Hodaka began experimenting with woodblock prints in 1949, and in 1951 he exhibited his woodblock prints and oil paintings together. In 1952 Hodaka exhibited prints at the Japan Print Association’s (Hanga Kyokai) annual show and again received an encouraging response.

In 1953, Hodaka and his fiancée, the artist Chizuko Inoue [Yoshida Chizuko 吉田千鶴子 (1924-2017)] married and built a house in the family compound. He and Chizuko joined the Abstract Art Club that year and Hodaka increasingly focused on his woodblock prints, creating 36 prints during that year.

Hodaka began to create exhibitions of his own work and then expanded his showings to the international art biennials. He also showed in almost all of the College Women’s Association of Japan (CWAJ) annual print shows. These venues allowed Hodaka creative freedom and he was continually on the cutting edge in using new print technologies.

As with all the Yoshida family artists, Hodaka frequently traveled abroad. While he traveled to many countries, he was most heavily influenced by indiginous cultures and their artifacts.

Looked at within his own specific art historical context, Hodaka is a good example of a Japanese artist who remained independent, while being fully engaged in the international art world and its clientele.

Stages of Artistic Development

Instead of having a straight line development, Hodaka's work moved forward in a series of stages. For example, his 1955 encounter in Mexico with primitive Pre-Columbian artifacts and architecture radically reoriented his art. A survey of the total range of his work - about 600 prints over 45 years - reveals distinct periods, each having major changes in subject matter, vocabulary, style, and color pallet. His styles, while always his own, drew from Expressionism, Pop, Photorealism, and Color Field abstraction. Broadly speaking most of his prints would be categorized as sosaku hanga.

As identified by Eugene Skibbe, Hodaka Yoshida collector and scholar, Hodaka's work can be broken into nine stages (six major and three transitional) which structured Hodaka’s 45 year career. He states: "Each stage has its own vocabulary, color palette, and style." 

1950-53 Early Prints - semi-abstract visual essays reflecting on an object or people in emotional states with little or no reference to spatial depth or perspective.  [See the print Love and Hate, IHL Cat. #1053.]

1953-54 Buddhist Prints - modern reformulations of Buddhist sculpture and architecture in a variety of artistic styles, e.g. abstract to realistic.

1955-63 Primitive Energy Prints - abstractions of the primitive in Pre-Columbian forms achieving a feeling of motion.

1963-66 Folk Prints (Transition A) - primitive abstractions expressed in an entirely new way reflecting the tumultuous times and influenced by New York's Pop art scene.

1966-74 Mythology and Landscape Prints - Pop art exposé of modern culture in decline using mass-media images with employing collage.

1974-79 House and Nude Prints (Transition B) - images displaying the tension and paradox between the old and modern with continued use of collage in many prints.

1979-84 From My Collection Prints - a refinement of his previous transitional phase using his photographs as primary elements.

1984-91 Recollection Prints (Transition C) - continued use of photographs showing old and distressed objects, giving prominence to color.

1991-95 Wall Prints - the human story on the surfaces of old walls which paralleled his published poetry.

Examples of Hodaka's Stages in Artistic Development (for reference only - not part of this collection)

Use of Varied Printing Techniques

The print technology Hodaka used was not limited to woodblock, but included monoprinting, wood engraving, copper etching, silkscreen, lithograph, zinc plate, and often employed photo-transfer techniques. In this regard he was a pioneer in Japan in the 1960's and 70's. His subject matter was drawn from cultural objects all around the world. In spite of these various dynamics, each of Hodaka's periods is an exploration in the same basic direction, into what might be called modernist expressions of primitive human vitality. Individual prints show great artistry in composition and color.

Leadership Role

Hodaka became a leader among Japanese print artists. He was a member of the Nihon Hanga Kyokai (Japan Print Association) from 1952 and, in 1978, he became a committee member in the Japan Artists' Association and later a representative to the International Artists' Association and one of its vice presidents. On behalf of the Japan Print Association, he oversaw the enormous task of researching and organizing its "25 Years of World Exhibitions of Modern Print Art," which was held in 1981 in Tokyo. He exhibited at the Tokyo Biennale, Lugano, Ljubljana, Krakow, Frechen, Ibiza, and others. He received eleven key prizes and honors, the last of which was the posthumously awarded Fourth Order of the Rising Sun in 1995. In 1957 he taught Japanese woodblock techniques at the universities of Hawaii and Oregon and at Haystack Mountain School of Crafts. 

Hodaka's wife, Chizuko Yoshida, née Inoue, (1924-) [Yoshida Chizuko 吉田千鶴子 (1924-2017) and their daughter Ayomi Yoshida (1958-) [see the artist's website https://ayomi-yoshida.com/] are both artists, and their son Takasuke (b. 1959) is an art jewelry maker. In November 1995, Hodaka died suddenly and unexpectedly from an aneurism.

Japanese Qualities of Hodaka's Art

The Japanese qualities of Hodaka's art are not difficult to discern. His use of flat areas of color is characteristic of the Japanese aesthetic, as is his tendency to crop subject matter, float a central image, and join line and color into patterns that mimic brocade. In addition, his fascination with old, used artifacts reveals the traditional Japanese values of wabi (imperfection) and sabi (age) as they related to objects, poetry, and the tea ceremony.

Yet, Hodaka's work remains unequivocally modern and international in scope. As an artist, he drew on what was available worldwide for subject matter, techniques, and places to exhibit. And most importantly, what ignited his deepest artistic response was a universal trait evident in all human beings and human culture - that inner burst of energy that was the root of magic and ultimately of all that followed. For there is, as he once said, "an absolute in human existence that defies the flow of civilization."

Literature

"The Artist as Seer: Yoshida Hodaka 1926-1995," Eugene M. Skibbe appearing in Andon 55, Journal of the Society for Japanese Art, November 1996, p. 3-16.

Collections (partial list)

Brooklyn Museum; Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; Portland Art Museum, Portland, Oregon; The British Museum; Art Institute of Chicago; Carnegie Museum of Art; New York Museum of Modern Art; Tokyo Metropolitan Museum; Hiroshima Contemporary Art Museum: Machida City Museum of Graphic Arts, Tokyo; Honolulu Academy of Arts; Yale University Art Gallery; Spencer Museum of Art, University of Kansas; Smithsonian Institution; Harvard Art Museum; The Museum of Modern Art, Kamakura & Hayama; The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo

Typical Signatures and Seal of the Artist

Prints in Collection

click on thumbnail for print details