20th-Century artist Hiroshi Yoshida's serene woodblock prints of famous landmarks

Hiroshi Yoshida was a 20th Century Japanese painter and woodblock printer. He is known for his landscape prints that offer an exotic interpretation of the world. The artist was a keen traveller and visited Europe, North America and Asia, and along the way he created numerous prints of non-Japanese subjects done in traditional Japanese woodblock style. In his works of landmarks such as the Taj Mahal, the Grand Canyon and the Swiss Alps, they take on a serene, graphic beauty cloaked in a veil of pastel hues.

Hiroshi was considered part of the shin hanga or “new print” movement, a creative process where the artist, carver, printer and publisher engaged in a division of labour. Yet after 1925, he shed those constraints and participated in each stage of printmaking himself, known as sosaku hanga.

His works are currently on show at Ronin Gallery in New York, which specialises in Japanese and east Asian contemporary art. The show, Hiroshi Yoshida: Worldly Visions, demonstrates Hiroshi’s eye for colour, and ability to seemingly transport viewers to another world where a rose-tint of adventure inhabits each piece. His composition skills and minute detail in each print is fascinating, and it’s no surprise the artist often used as many as 30 cherry wood blocks to create each work.

Hiroshi Yoshida: Worldly Visions is on now at the Ronin Gallery, New York until 25 February 2017.