81/150: Naoko Matsubara – Always Has & Always Will

A solo exhibition by Naoko Matsubara (1937), the distinguished Japanese-Canadian woodcut print artist, is at Abozzo Gallery this summer.

Throughout her 70-year career, Matsubara has been driven by a passion for breaking new ground. Her renowned woodcut prints “speak through a joyful language of colour, exploring personal and art historical subjects,” as the Art Gallery of Ontario put it for her solo exhibition there in 2025.

The exhibition at Abbozzo was conceived as a “symbolic kaleidoscopic palette of the artist’s vision,” the gallery says. It runs through August, 2026. (Images are from Abbozzo Galllery exhibition site unless otherwise noted).

Titled Always Has and Always Will, the exhibition brings together multiple media, woodcuts, collage, sculpture, and watercolor compositions, revealing both the coherence of Matsubara’s artistic thinking and her unmistakable visual language – Exhibition Statement

The best way to understand Matsubara’s artistry is to watch this exceptional film, on Vimeo:

Direct link to the film (executive produced by renowned Canadan architect Bruce Kuwabara)

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Matsubara has a whole series on hands – from the inspiration of the hands of a baby to the hands of a conductor (below) and many more. See In Praise of Hands on her website, here.

Matsubara was born on Shikoku Island into a Shinto family, and grew up in Kyoto. She completed a BFA at the Kyoto Academy of Fine Art in 1960 and was a Fulbright Scholar at what is now Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, where she completed her MFA in 1962. Matsubara was a Special Invited Student at the Royal College of Art in London that same year. After travelling extensively in Europe and Asia, the artist returned to Japan for two years, before returning to the United States. There she worked as assistant to the German-American professor, publisher and illustrator Fritz Eichenberg, and also taught at the Pratt Institute of Graphic Art in New York, as well as at the University of Rhode Island.

Matsubara moved to Canada in 1972 and lives in Oakville, Ontario. She has continued to be extremely active as an artist: locally, nationally and internationally. Since 1960 she has had more than 75 solo exhibitions, in the USA, Canada, Japan, England, Ireland, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Holland and Mexico and has also participated in numerous group exhibitions.

Naoko Matsubara’s website, here.

Her full C.V. here.

At Abbozzo Gallery, here.

A feature in the Art Gallery of Ontario magazine Foyer, here.

On Artsy, here.

Notes about woodblock printmaking – This has always been at the core of Matsubara’s artistic practice. The oldest form of printmaking, woodblock printing is a relief print technique in which images, designs, or words are carved in reverse onto a block of wood. Applying oil-based inks onto a wooden carving, Matsubara then prints her images onto handmade Japanese and Korean paper.

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This is No. 81 in 150 Artists, an ongoing series on Canadian artists you should know.