One of He Kun's color reduction woodcuts

I don't know the title of this piece - if any readers out there do and/or have more information about this contemporary Chinese artist, please comment below! I found two of He Kun's colorful and playful reduction woodcuts for sale on Amazon of all places. But doing a Google search for the artist I found a website with some information and that features several more impressive reduction woodcuts, most of which feature people or animals in landscapes and make surprising and dramatic use of color.

The sky seems flooded with scattered shards. Perhaps they have broken off of the central landmass, and some have even fallen into the water, and so I fear a bit for the lone swimmer. My eyes rest on him and I am calmed. The swimmer moves in a path parallel to a steer meandering across the field near the water's edge. They have both moved just past the halfway point of the picture plane, and so I feel confident that they know where they are going and will soon arrive at their destination. Assuming they have a destination. The world around them is colorful chaos. The symmetry we perceive is but one perspective, the pockets of serenity are tightly localized. What grandeur in this partnership between the inner life of the human mind and the outward state of the material world.

"Year of the Goat"

4" x 4" linoleum cut stamp, printing with black oil-based ink on Stonehenge paper and hand-colored with watercolors.

Lo! the baby opens its mouth
Even when 'tis shown a flower. 

-Kubota Seifu-Jo

I made this stamp for a friend who is having a baby soon! The family of this child possess a great love for the natural world, appreciation for artistic expression, and identify profoundly with certain totems. Coming up with a suitable image was daunting at first as it seemed like such a tall order. But then this simple image of a stalwart goat guarding an egg - a symbol of both fragility and fertility - came to mind. A winter rowan tree expands behind the goat to honor the new child's mother. Green grass and the rising sun signal that winter will soon give way to spring and a new generation.

"Winter Blossom" by Hung Liu

This is a woodcut of sorts. The artist Hung Liu doesn't make woodcuts in any traditional way. Her process used for this image is described on Magnolia Editions Blog:

"Winter Blossom is a hybrid of two processes, incorporating both traditional and unorthodox printmaking techniques. The image was first cut into a block of wood using a laser, after which further edits were hand-carved by Hung Liu. The woodcut was printed on a Takach etching press using traditional black relief ink; all of the colors in each print (digitally manipulated by the artist) were then registered and printed using a UV-cured acrylic inkjet printer."

This combination of ancient craft and modern, digital technology comes through in the final image. The vertical, green lines behind the portrait remind me of both wood grain and lines of code from The Matrix. The pink flowers that bloom from a gnarly tree branch refer to beauty in nature, and yet they scream urban graffiti through the skilled-yet-hasty way they are rendered.

Photograph of Zhen Fei

The branch and blossoms slither and drip ominously around portrait of Zhen Fei. We see only the face of the legendary concubine, reproduced from a century-old photograph. The garish colors and hidden costume transform her from a mere historical figure to a modern and confrontational presence. She looks directly at us, and yet her face seems impersonal, like a mask. Her silent, doll eyes taunt, reminding us of everything we don't know and will never find out.