New to the Allentown Art Museum, the exhibit Katagami: The Japanese Stencil highlights the appealing design and the cross-cultural history of Japanese stencils. For centuries, the Japanese have printed fabric using katagami. Though these stencils look delicate, dyers could use them 150 to 300 times. Stencil cutters carved them from shibugami, a strong paper made of layers of mulberry bark fused with fermented persimmon juice and cured by smoking. These artisans traditionally completed a seven-year apprenticeship and specialized in a certain technique: cutting stripes, for instance. In spite of the skill involved in producing katagami, the Japanese saw these stencils as dyers' tools rather than works of art.
Western designers drew on the stencils' stylized interpretation of nature to create patterns for textiles, wallpaper, stained glass and even furniture. They also valued katagami for embodying arts and crafts movement principles like skilled handcraft.
There will be four rotations of the exhibit, and the first is on display now through August 5.
Allentown Art Museum | 31 N. 5th St., Allentown | 610.432.4333 | allentownartmuseum.org
