Posted by Laurie Petrie Rogers on August 24, 2001 at 22:55:06:
In Reply to: Re: Hiroshi Yoshida posted by Richard Parks on August 24, 2001 at 15:17:49:
Richard, "Sailing Boats-Morning" is illustrated with the square seal "Toku" (special) in the upper left margin as Lot #171 Sotheby's New York 1987 Japanese Prints and Works of Art catalogue. It is titled in pencil "Sailing Boats" but stamped "Morning." The Hiroshi Yoshida signature is stamped also. The version of "Sailing Boats-Morning" with jizure seal is illustrated in the same catalogue as Lot #176. It is both titled and signed in pencil. In contrast, the later edition version of this series (lacking a jizure seal) has both a printed (vs. stamped or pencil-signed) title and signature. There appear to be three distinct versions of this series. If the Sotheby's estimates can be used to provide any clues, they valued the jizure and Toku versions equally. Versions with no jizure or Toku seal appear to be valued significantly lower (see Butterfields 1997 Fine Asian Works of Art catalogue Lot #2171). Of course, this does not explain when the version with the Toku seal was printed, if Hiroshi Yoshida printed it himself, or what its significance was.