Jonas Wood

Pace Prints is pleased to present Five Bonsais, a new suite of five Ukiyo-e woodcuts by Jonas Wood.

Five Bonsais is the second series of Ukiyo-e woodcuts that Jonas Wood created at Pace Prints with Master Printer Yasu Shibata, who collaborated with the artist for fifteen months to complete the edition.

Reflecting on working with Shibata on this project, Wood says,

“Once again, I’ve been blown away by his process and eye, and his ability to translate my mark, color, and the feel of my work so precisely.”

Each image in Five Bonsais required between 8 to 15 wood blocks, which Shibata carved using traditional hand tools. The blocks were inked with up to 66 individual colors, each applied by hand for every impression of the edition. A selection of the hand-carved wood blocks are displayed alongside the prints.

Potted plants are a significant part of Wood’s personal iconography which often blends with his interest in art historical references to form a composite of personal and collective memory. The artist has been making drawings and paintings of bonsais for the past few years and has amassed a collection of images originating from still lifes and earlier works. He drew liberally from these sources and personal reference points to create Five Bonsais. Greek Pot, for example, originated from a drawing series he completed in the late 2000s depicting various vessels seen on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.

The different styles of pots in this series often reflect the objects' significance to the artist at different points in his life. Terracotta Pot references a ubiquitous style of pot, found in most garden stores on the West Coast, of which he purchased many when first moving to Los Angeles. Grid Pot, Dino Pot and Mark Pot are all based on variations of ceramic pots created by Shio Kusaka, Wood’s wife and fellow artist.

Jonas Wood’s graphic approach, in which he takes apart found and personal images and rebuilds them to emphasize pattern, form, and color, lends itself to the complex, distinctive mark-making of ukiyo-e woodcut. Shibata’s expert hand follows the artist’s in unraveling and reweaving the visual fabric of the images, a process in which fragmented memories and references coalesce into fresh, unique objects of contemplation.

Jonas Wood (b. 1977 Boston, Massachusetts; lives and works in Los Angeles) earned a B.A. in Psychology at Hobart and William Smith Colleges in Geneva, New York, and an M.F.A. in Painting and Drawing at the University of Washington in Seattle, Washington. Wood has been the subject of numerous exhibitions worldwide, including solo exhibitions at the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, and the Dallas Museum of Art. His public art commissions include the High Line, New York, and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles. His work is included in the permanent collections of institutions including the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C.; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Guggenheim Museum, New York; The Broad, Los Angeles; Museum of Modern Art, New York; and Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. In 2019, Phaidon published the first monograph dedicated to Wood’s paintings and drawings. He is represented by David Kordansky Gallery, Gagosian, and Karma.