Kiyoshi Saito - Nikenchaya Teahouse, Gion (祇園 二軒茶屋)
Kiyoshi Saito - Nikenchaya Teahouse, Gion (祇園 二軒茶屋)
| Artist | Kiyoshi Saito (Japan, 1907-1997) |
| Year | 1907-1997 |
| Materials | Color woodblock print on washi (Japanese handmade paper) |
| Size | (H)29.0cm, (W)44.0cm |
| Framed size | (H)47.1cm, (W)59.3cm, (D)2.5cm |
| Rarity | Unknown edition (edition size and number not recorded) |
| Medium | |
| Signature | Hand-signed in white ink at lower left inside the image; artist's red seal printed just above it; embossed blind mark in the left margin. |
| Condition and Authenticity | Overall light toning; creases at upper left and right corners; slight cockling at left edge; margins possibly trimmed. Colors remain strong. This artwork does not include a certificate of authenticity. |
| Provenance | Auction in Japan |
| Frame | Dark wood frame with cream mount and glazing. Water staining is visible on the paper backing at the rear of the frame. Supplied with an outer carton and a yellow cloth bag. |
Kiyoshi Saito is the printmaker who carried the sosaku-hanga (creative print) movement onto the world stage. His award at the first Sao Paulo Biennale in 1951 was the first international print prize won by a Japanese artist of his generation, and his work entered museum collections across Europe and the United States soon afterwards.
This sheet records Nakamuraro, the historic teahouse that stands beside the south gate of Yasaka Shrine in the Gion district of Kyoto. Two teahouses once faced each other along the approach to the shrine, and that pair gave the place its name, Nikenchaya, literally "the two teahouses". The surviving eastern house has served visitors for roughly four and a half centuries and is still celebrated for its grilled tofu with sweet miso. Saito turns the facade into a flat architecture of planes and lines: the lattice screens become a silver grid, the tiled roof a broad band of grey woodgrain, and the shop curtain a field of deep indigo. A single vermilion bench with one white tea bowl carries the only warm accent in the composition, answered diagonally by the artist's red seal.
The grain of the woodblocks is deliberately left visible across the roof and the pavement, a hallmark of Saito's technique, and the pigment is printed so lightly that the fibres of the handmade paper remain palpable. The sheet is presented in a dark wood frame with a cream mount and glazing, ready to hang.