Gyotaku Fish Prints

  In Japanese Gyo=Fish, and Taku=Imprint. Traditionally gyotaku was created using rice paper and carbon-based sumi ink. Today most gyotaku is printed on a variety of paper and cloth materials, and artists often substitute the sumi ink for non-toxic acrylic paints. Artists may also incorporate color pencil, paints or pastels in order to create colorful renditions of the original species. Collage art, or the layering of papers and cut-outs, is a modernized approach to gyotaku that is being refined by a few Hawaii gyotaku artists. The collage work creates multi-layered coloring and textures, and highlights the beauty of the papers as much as the gyotaku “subject