Multi.Colored—tattooed people, tattoo dreams

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Hanukkah has begun, the Solstice is past and Christmas is coming.  In the USA at least, it seems as though the nation’s focus is on Buying Stuff.  Not that this is a bad thing; it makes people happy and keeps people employed, and we definitely need that!

But the best holiday gift of all need not cost a cent.

Give of yourself.  Spend some time with someone.  Consider your priorities and think about what you might regret later if you missed doing it today.

If you’ve got a long-standing disagreement, be the first one to bury the hatchet.  Call or email someone you haven’t seen for a while.

Take time to count your friends and count your blessings.  Find a reason to be happy and find a way to make someone else happy.

Don’t focus so much on your own holiday that you forget to celebrate other people’s.  December is a month for wrapping up the old and preparing for the new.  You don’t have to make a New Year’s resolution–just tell yourself you’re going to look for the bright side from now on.

I hope you all have happiness and peace, regardless of which holidays you celebrate.  And let’s all work together to see the new year in with happiness and hope!

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Sorry I have taken so long between posts lately! I have been working as an intern on the Lifehacker web site, and the time I used to spend browsing around for body art information has been spent on other things. 

However, to make up for that a little bit, here’s some great links.

Evil Tattoo’s Tattoo Gallery
Tattoo Finder
5 W’s Tattoos
Tattoo Art of Pat Fish
TattooArtists.org
BMEInk (a lot of adult oriented material; viewer discretion advised)
About.com’s tattoo and piercing galleries

What are your favorite web sites featuring body art?  I’m always up for someplace new to look!

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In my last couple posts I talked about rude, crude tattoos and images of death. In the wake of the elections in the USA, I think it’s now time to focus on upbeat, positive images that reflect well on us and send a positive message to the world as well.

I wrote earlier about spiritual designs.  Putting an affirmation of your spiritual beliefs on your skin could be one way of sending a positive message, although in today’s increasingly fractured world other people might not see the message you are trying to send.   But in thousands of years of religious art, there are plenty of examples of designs that uplift both the wearer and the observer.  It’s worth doing research to find exactly the right design.  The usual run of religious (mainly Christian) flash can be found just about anywhere.  You want something that represents you, not a bazillion others with exactly the same flash, right?

Another form of positive design is a memorial to a lost loved one.  I have mentioned before that I am not a fan of fine-line portraits.  I think there are plenty of other ways to honor those we have lost.  Think about what mattered to that person and find a design that showcases that.  I have a stylized dragon on my back to honor my grandmother.  That, to me, is more profound than just getting her name or a portrait inked on my skin.

And of course there is a wide lexicon of images that are upbeat and postitive all on their own.  “Sunshine, lollypops and rainbows” is more than just the title of a 60s bubblegum song.  :)  Well-done Celtic designs can combine the spiritual and the decorative.  The tried-and-true images of four-leaf clovers, lucky horseshoes and the like are popular for good reason.  There are more elaborate designs representing good fortune from pagan beliefs and non-Western cultures.  Once you set your mind to it, the possibilities are limitless.

What kinds of positive images does your ink show the world?
photo credit: showbizsuperstar

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I’m taking an art class this semester, and yesterday I wore my TATTOOS ARE MY WAY OF INVESTING IN ART t-shirt to class.

This led to an interesting discussion with one of my classmates, who has several tattoos herself.  She said that all her tattoos have a common theme, something very spiritually meaningful to her.  Like me, her ink is usually covered by clothing, but she described some of her tattoos and explained why they fit her theme.

I obviously never had a “theme” in choosing my tattoos, but all of them have deep personal meaning to me, so in that sense they go together even though visually and stylistically they don’t match in any way.  But the idea of planning each tattoo with one central theme in mind intrigued me.  I wonder how common that approach to body art must be?

Obviously, the people who get whole-body Japanese tattoos are following that kind of philosophy.  But is a gangbanger whose ink reflects gang sensibilities even though not coming together in one unified design doing the same?  What about a person whose tattoos relate to the same general principle (religious art, for example) but are all done in varying styles or by different artists and present a mish-mosh of visual effects when seen as a whole?

What happens if a person starts out with one theme in mind and then goes off in a different direction?  Can the original ink be altered to match the new theme?  Should it be?  I’m reminded of the tattooed lady in Heinlein’s Stranger in a Strange Land who starts off as a standard-issue sideshow performer and then has her tattoos transformed into a religious work of art by her husband, the tattoo artist.

And what if some of the art is done by one artist and some of it is done by another artist with an entirely different style?

I guess what I’m asking is whether having a theme results in a “unified field” of body art or not. 

Do you have a theme?  Do you know anyone who planned their ink in advance?  I’d be interested to hear what others think about this.
photo credit: rasseon

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I am a big fan of tattoo web sites, as one might imagine. This one caught my eye today and it definitely deserves a wider audience.

Carl Zimmer’s Science Tattoo Emporium. My daughter the Linguistics Ph.D. candidate would like the tattoo of the glottal stop.

Yet more proof that not all tattooed people are hirsute bikers.

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Here’s a quick reference guide to the blog, so far.

An Introduction

Before You Ink, Think

Preliminaries
About The Actual Ink
Where To Put It
Important Considerations
Family Reactions
What To Wear (And Not Wear)
Yes, It Hurts (And How To Deal With That)
Religious Objections

Aftercare

About Plastic Wrap (Don’t!)
About Bandages
Protecting Your Newly Inked Skin
Tattoo Specific Skin Care Products
The Healing Process

Choosing Your Design

Languages As Graphics
Inspirations For Original Designs, Part 1: Your Life
Part 2: Your Family And Your Fan Clubs
Part 3: Your Spiritual Beliefs
On Copying Other People’s Artwork
Part 4: Memorials
Part 5: Reworking Your Existing Tats

Next up, a brief look at the history of tattoos.

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(Otherwise known as Everything Old Is New Again)

Even if you’ve spent plenty of time thinking about your design, and working with your artist to create it, the old saying that “There’s nothing so sure as change” still applies. As time goes by, you may well change your mind about that tattoo. So, then what?

How about having it re-worked into something else? Not every design is suitable for this, of course, but with enough imagination and careful ink placement it may well be possible to transform something old and/or unwanted into something fresh and new.

Amy Krakow’s Total Tattoo Book includes some photos of old designs being covered up by, or reworked into, new ones.

A lot depends on what color the ink was in the original design and where it’s located. Black ink, of course, will be the most difficult to cover up. But even that can be worked around if you’re willing to take time and think about it.

My own transformation

I had a small Eye of Horus on my ankle that I was never entirely happy with. The artist went too deep on the outline, and over time the black outline spread into what was supposed to be the gold color of the Eye, and obliterated the nice little spiral in the “eyeball’ that had originally been highlighted in white ink. When I consulted with another artist about re-doing the gold color, she explained to me that tattoo ink is transparent, not opaque (which, believe it or not, I had not known up till then) so it would not be possible to color over the excess black with more gold. However, she suggested that she could highlight the entire area with gold after she applied the new surrounding design, to make it look like the Eye of Horus had been designed with a golden highlight. And that’s what she did.

Here’s how that turned out:

So if you’ve changed your mind about your ink, don’t make the tattoo-removal clinic your first stop. Get someone to take a picture of your tattoo, and print out several copies at life size on plain paper (the quality of the reproduction is not as important here as is having a good surface to draw on and paper that doesn’t cost a lot if you toss out several sheets while you’re working through your idea). Try drawing a new design with the old one. If you don’t have much in the way of artistic skills, sketch in what you want as best you can and take the drawing to your favorite tattoo artist and see what he or she says about it.

Even if you’re not a fan of the Transformers, you can still be transformed.

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One of our cats died early Thursday morning, after a long illness.

And thus, today’s entry is about one of the most profoundly personal of all tattoos, one designed as a memorial for a lost loved one. From the simple addition of someone’s name, to something as elaborate as my nephew’s back piece that serves as a memorial for his fallen colleagues in Iraq and Afghanistan, the placement of an image to honor the loved and lost can be among the most satisfying of decorations.

It is important, though, in the decision to get a memorial tattoo, that one not act too much in haste. Taking proper time to think, consider, and allow the first sharp pain of the loss to die away a bit is essential to getting the very best design.

Start by making a list of all the things that would serve to remind you of your lost loved one. Set the list aside for a while (adding to it if you happen to think of something else). Come back to it in a month or so and reconsider. (Your ink will last forever, so waiting and thinking carefully first won’t hurt, and can really help make the design the absolute best.)

Would a portrait be appropriate? You will need to find an artist who specializes in portrait work, for the best results. Would a picture of something else do better? Would it be enough to just have a simple “In Loving Memory” with the person’s or pet’s name and dates? How large a design do you want, and where should it best be placed? Even more so than with other designs, a memorial should be the product of careful consideration.

My dragon tattoo is in honor of my grandmother, and it took me about a year of thinking, drawing, and re-drawing to get the design perfected. I didn’t put her name on it, but I did have the artist add a very tiny Chinese character for “woman” underneath. When a Chinese friend saw the tattoo for the first time, he said “Oh, it’s a GIRL dragon.” I’m sure my grandmother, who always thought that she was the reincarnation of a 9th century Chinese poet, would have smiled at that.

This blog, by the way, is partly my memorial to our cat. Her name was Calypso, and she was a calico, and I often called her “Multicolor” in honor of her lovely fur.

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Today I’m going to talk about a somewhat different approach to tattoos that honor one’s spiritual beliefs.

A lot of people want designs that represent some aspect of their religion or spirituality. From crosses and Stars of David, to
pentagrams and crescent moons, to stylized representations of all kinds of deities, it’s often important to have a symbol of something that plays a major role in one’s life.

But there’s nothing that says one has to settle for the same-old-same-old in this area. I know that religious beliefs are kind of a touchy subject, so I’m going to try to take a somewhat general approach to this.

There are fairly common symbols of most major religions, like the Christian cross or the Jewish Star of David or the Muslim crescent. Many people find those symbols to be profound representations of their beliefs and that’s all they want or need when it comes to picking a design. But almost all world religions have ancient roots, and perhaps it would be better to look at designs that are less common but still profoundly representative.

Great art on canvas, great art on skin

Start by looking in books about religious art. There are wonderful pictures and designs from illuminated manuscripts from the past. There are photos of temples, churches, and mosques with glorious artwork incorporated into their interiors and exteriors, any of which could be adapted into a tattoo design. How about something from the Book of Kells? Here is a link to a site that will sell you the whole thing on DVD, and you can browse the text and illuminations to your heart’s content.

Or, how about some of the glorious Islamic decorations from the Taj Mahal? Most of us have only seen the standard pictures from a distance that show the entire building, but when one looks closer, one can truly appreciate the brilliance of the artists who created it.

Likewise, the Torah has been illuminated by countless artists and can be a rich source of inspiration. Here is a link to a modern illuminated Torah that should be a great source for unique religious designs.

Architectural inspiration

And of course that’s only the beginning. Try to think of buildings, art, and other representations of your beliefs that could be adapted for your design and I’m sure you’ll find a wide world full of inspiration.

One caution, though. If you find photos of other people with tattoos or painted designs, please, don’t copy those designs exactly. Those designs have personal and religious meaning to the person who wears them–think how you’d feel if someone who knew nothing about your religion copied something from your tradition for purely decorative purposes without knowing what it meant. Be as respectful to those people as you would wish them to be to you.

Which, come to think of it, is an appropriate way to think about spiritual design.

photo credit: mockstar
photo credit: Ya Susanne

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Many people get someone else’s name as a tattoo, and wind up regretting it later. It might not happen with a child’s name, or a parent’s, or a grandparent’s, but it often does with Significant Others. (Yeah, I’m looking at you, Johnny Depp, “Wino forever,” and Billy Bob Thornton and Angelina Jolie, washing each other right outta their… skins.)

What do you do if you want to declare eternal feelings for someone, but don’t want to get caught (literally) with your pants down later on? Especially because tattoo removal has been described as “Being snapped with a rubber band stretched from here to Venezuela.”

A reminder without a name
Find an image instead. Something that would be meaningful to the two of you, but that won’t be exclusive to just the one person should you break up later on. What did you do on your first date? OK, maybe you don’t want to commemorate the Three Stooges marathon. But maybe you went out afterwards and discovered that you really liked each other over a couple of cups of coffee. Find a cool picture of a coffee mug and use that as your inked-in trip down memory lane. If your Coffee Companion turns into used-up grounds later on, you can always explain that image in some other way having nothing to do with Ms. or Mr. Wrong.

If you’re a big fan of some celebrity, or a band, should you get a picture of That Star or That Band’s logo inked on? Might be cool when you’re a young metal-head or Adam Sandler devotee, but what about later? Ask someone older than you are what they thought was just the ultimate in cool when they were your age and how they feel about it nowadays. My brother was the biggest fan of Herman’s Hermits in the world when he was a teenager. Now that he’s in his 50s he’d probably be getting Peter Noone’s face zapped off him as fast as he could manage it. When I first realized I wanted a tattoo, at age 16, I wanted my favorite little doodle of a flower in a pot tattooed on the inside of my left ankle. In green ink, no less. I still doodle that flower, but man, I’m glad I didn’t make a permanent commitment to it.

Pick an image. My brother might have gone with a stylized crown to represent “I’m Henry VIII, I Am” and I could have gotten a realistic chrysanthemum. Those have staying power where the more specific image would not.

Besides, if you have to sit down and think about a better way to show your devotion, you won’t be getting inked in haste and zapped over weeks and weeks and weeks sometime in the future. You know the old saying “Measure twice, cut once”? In this case, think twice, ink once. And your chances of keeping that ink infinitely improve.

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