[Baren]: The mailing list / discussion forum for woodblock printmaking. Baren Digest Saturday, 14 March 1998 Volume 02 : Number 095 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: April Vollmer & John Yamaguchi Date: Fri, 13 Mar 1998 12:02:49 -0400 Subject: [Baren 478] Different kinds of baren I bought my baren from Goto, not Gosho....I understand they used to work together? My baren is an 8 strand ki urushi, with a wooden back instead of one made from washi. It is quite light, though not as light as the washi one David described Gosho making....I am wondering how much more a washi one would cost, and if it would be useful to have another for printing different size areas. I also have a ball bearing one, which is quite smooth in movement, but also fairly heavy. Where do you get your baren covers? (and what is the proper name for them?) The ones I ordered from Elaine at McClain's were too small! I find I must learn more Japanese to define the particulars of my tools! April Vollmer ------------------------------ From: David Bull Date: Sat, 14 Mar 1998 08:14:19 +0900 Subject: [Baren 479] Re: Different kinds of baren April wrote: > My baren is an 8 strand ki urushi, with a wooden back > instead of one made from washi. etc. The baren you have is described in the 'baren' pages on the Encyclopedia, and you'll find the price information you asked about there also (under 'Suppliers') > Where do you get your baren covers? (and what is the > proper name for them?) That material for covering a baren is usually described as a 'bamboo skin', although I've been told that botanists prefer to use the term 'bamboo bark'. The Japanese term is takenokawa (take=bamboo kawa=skin). It's the sheath within which the bamboo grows as it spurts upwards. Once the stem has become hard and firm, the skin/bark is no longer needed, and falls away from the plant piece by piece (usually in early-mid summer). I get them from a shop that sells nothing but bamboo skin, and this place is described in a story in the Encyclopedia (under 'Personal Face of Printmaking' / Visits to Printmakers / Kaneko Shoten) > The ones I ordered from Elaine at McClain's were too small! They're all 'too small' when you get them. They have to be moistened and stretched sideways to enlarge them so that are wide enough to wrap around the baren. This also has the effect of drawing them very very tightly in place as the skin dries. Stretching them sideways without splitting them is quite some 'trick', and nearly impossible to describe in words. There will be an Encyclopedia page on this one day 'soon', after I get time to get over to Gosho san's place with my camera to try and record the process step-by-step. Dave P.S. Steve Smarson in England has put together an excellent set of annotated links that will be of interest to printmakers. http://dspace.dial.pipex.com/smarson/ ------------------------------ From: Jean Eger Date: Fri, 13 Mar 1998 22:53:59 -0800 Subject: [Baren 480] Re: Baren Digest V2 #94 David: Around the time of Chinese New Year there is at least one store in San Francisco's Chinatown which sells very simple prints, which I think are called "ink prints." I don't know if they are woodblock prints or not, but they could be, because the quality of the printing varies greatly. It appears that they have not been made by machine. They are all line prints with Chinese characters and stylized pictures. A journalist visitor from Japan told me that they mostly say good luck and prosperity. These prints come in bunches of, say, 10 for $2.50. They are extremely inexpensive. One cannot buy just one of these prints. I am looking at one with red letters on yellow paper. There are a deer, a bat, a warrior on a tiger, two circular diagrams, a horse and rider, and two horizontal pictures of men, some of whom have caps with droopy rabbit ears and swords and long skirts, and lots of Chinese characters. I guess the rabbit ears are ear flaps on the headgear. One package of prints included a print of a little pointy shoe, possibly the kind that women with bound feet used to wear. That may be a completely wrong interpretation of what I saw, but maybe not. I have seen two exhibitions of those unusual shoes recently. A store in the Mission DistrictI sold me a couple of books about Chinese Folk Prints. The author was Wang Shucun (1923 - ). One is called PAPER JOSS, Deity Worship Through Folk Prints, published by New World Press, 24 Baiwanzhuang Road, Beijing 100037, China. Amazingly, I see that exact same print in the book, p. 170, with the description, "Auspicious Magic Figure." Guangzhou in Guangdong, Vermilion-line print. "During the lunar New Year in old China, various traditional magic figures were put on sale to cater to the people, both rural and urban, who worshiped and burned them as sacrificial offerings in the hope that this would bring them happiness and ward off all possible calamities in the coming year. The Heavenly Master Zhang appears in the upper part of this print together with an auspicious magic figure. The lower part contains a golden tablet which was said to bring good luck and eliminate disasters." Another print I purchased is in the book, page 173. It is called "Dragon-patterned Costume for the Heavenly God." In the book they call it "paper horse." Best wishes, Jean Eger ------------------------------ End of Baren Digest V2 #95 **************************