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A very lovely mezzo tint print by Kaoru Saito. Executed in shades of black, greys and white , it portrays a woman with a shawl and, in the background, rippling hills, a bird and a new moon. It is numbered # 36/60 and measures 17 3/8" by 15 1/8" – the image is 11 1/8" by 9 3/4". Mint condition – never framed, dated 1978. Saito Kaoru lives in Kanagawa Prefecture, where he was born. He is basically self-taught in the difficult mezzotint medium. Along with Hamaguchi and Hamanishi, Saito is one of the finest artists in mezzotint working in Japan today, and his prints have a finish and perfection which would be difficult to equal. The process includes scratching hundreds, if not thousands of passes across a metal plate until the entire surface has a rough, uniform texture. The plate would print solid black if it were now run through the press. A burnishing tool is then used to rub smooth the areas which will print from grey to white.
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