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Sadao Watanabe
As a youth, Watanabe became a Christian and chose to combine a dedication to his new faith with an interest in preserving the traditional (400 year old) folk craft of Okinawan stencil dying, or katazome. He spent several years as an apprentice learning techniques for dyeing kimono fabric, and then furthered his studies under the direction of stencil artist Keisuke Serizawa, as well as Soetsu Yanagi--the founder of the Japanese Folk Art Movement and a living national treasure of Japan.

The paper stencils Watanabe uses are cut from a heavy weight paper that has been strengthened by soaking in persimmon juice. This permits repeated use without significant deterioration. Interestingly, Watanabe’s technique allows for a final printing of the solid portion of the stencil in black ink, atop the colored portions--so both the positive and negative areas of the stencil are used. The strong black lines recall the work of Munakata Shiko, as well as earlier Buddhist artists.

Though the subject matter is Christian, the renditions are distinctly Japanese. A Noah’s Ark may be designed in the shape of an Oriental bamboo cricket cage, and at the Last Supper, disciples may sit on the floor, eating tai fish and wearing robes with kimono designs. Watanabe’s works offer a richness of color with the use of natural vegetable dyes, and a distinctively strong texture with the use of heavy handmade mulberry paper, which is soaked in water and crumpled before printing begins.

Watanabe's materials and processes are fully Japanese, but his style is universal. Even trained art curators sometimes fail at first sight to identify his art with any one country. His work enhances the collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, Museum of Modern Art in New York, the White House, Vatican, British Museum, Brauer Museum of Art at Valparaiso University and many others. Numerous books portray his prints, including Masao Takenaka's Biblical Prints by Sadeo Watanabe (Tokyo, l986). Watanabe died in January, 1996.