Saturday, July 26, 2008

Gyotaku - Fish Rubbing

If you are like me, when you are on vacation you like to do a little souvenir shopping - or at least some strolling and window shopping. Once you've spent a little time on the Cape, however, you start to see the same old tourist souvenirs everywhere - same stuff, different town! But I came upon a pretty cool place in Chatham. On the surface it is just a clothing store. But when you check out the art on the clothing you know you are seeing something unique. The name of the store is Blue Water Fish Rubbings and the artist, Jenny Bovey, uses actual fish, octopus, seahorses, lobsters, sharks, etc to make prints on the garments. She uses real fish (she has fishermen friends who bring them to her) which she allows to dry. Then she coats them with screen printers ink and stamps the cloth with them! She has had some of her fish for 25 years. This is an old Japanese technique called Gyotaku which literally means Fish Rubbing. Check out more info here.

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