Already a prolific and intensely committed artist at the time he became engaged in the Japanese Craft Movement in the mid 1930s, Munakata Shiko's friendships with Yanagi Soetsu (1889-1961), Kawai Kanjiro (1890-1966), and Hamada Shoji (1894-1978) led him to an awareness of the spiritual content in art. Using primarily Buddhist subject matter Munakata discovered that through the subjugation of personality he could, without self-consciousness, achieve a kind of unity with his work. He became the carving itself as he bent, near-sightedly, over his wood blocks. He claimed, as he gave himself over to the process, that his works virtually created themselves. Along with his colleagues, Munakata believed that no artist could work alone, but that in concert with a higher Buddhist or god-like power, beauty would be bestowed upon a work of art.

Another example of this print was Sold in these Rooms, lot 30, on October 16, 1990, in sale no. 7130.