Japanese art is often reflected in the use of tattoos and tattoos are an indigenous art form and date back along way in the use of Japanese art.

Tattoo art played a big role in my piece of coursework with the title ‘dark & light’; one of the tattoo artists who influenced me was the Japanese Tattooist Akio Oki.

Akio’s work is based around the designs called Ukiyo-e, which is Japanese for “pictures of the floating world”. Ukiyo- e was one of the most important types of art during the Tokougawa period, (1603 – 1867) in Japan. The style is a mixture of the realistic narrative of the emaki (“picture scrolls”) produced in the Kamakura period and the purely decorative style of the Momoyama and Tokugawa periods.

Screen paintings were the first works to be done in the Ukiyo-e style. These depic

The “pictures of the floating world” referred to low-brow lifestyles and popular culture, they also showed images of a reversed Japanese society, showing the total opposite of the Japanese social scale and cultures.

Ukiyo-e turned the aesthetics of traditional Japan upside down.

A photo of Akio Oki’s Tattoo Work incorporating ‘The Floating World’

Some topics in this essay:
Momoyama Tokugawa, Japanese Tattooists, Arts London, Ukiyo-e Japanese, Japanese Art, Japanese Aristocracy, Japan Art, japanese art, Oki Akio’s, wood block, Oki’s Tattoo, wood block printing, art form, block printing, “pictures floating world”, floating world”, “pictures floating, aspects life, Floating World’, daily pleasures, japanese society, ukiyo-e japanese,