While searching through my emails to find something to write mean things about, I found this little gem from IAM:Skarekrow. It’s a humorous twist on the much overdone oldschool swallow. This piece won first prize for best small tattoo at the Swedish Tattoo Convention. I can see why.
Tattoo by John Lind at House of Pain in Norrtälje, Sweden.
PS. Want me to review your tattoo? Email it to me.
Brian Froud and Amy Brown fairies get submitted to BME’s fairy tattoo gallery on a pretty regular basis, but of all the fairy tattoos that I see, one stands out as being done more than any other. I don’t know the original source of the design, and maybe someone reading this can tell me, but this simplified fairy just keeps getting done over and over and over — so much so that I’m beginning to think it’s the mark of some sisterhood cult that, being a dude, no one is willing to tell me about.
PS. Personally I like my fairies perverted or at least nude.
Update: Question answered!
From the popular BME “geek tattoo gallery“…
Highbrow Geek
(Turing Machine)
Lowbrow Geek
(Tetris Block Bracelet)
Definitely not a Geek
In regards to the previous entry’s first tattoo…
Hey Shannon,
Just a quick note on the "super emo" tattoo — Im 90% sure that Rob Dobi designed a shirt identical to that. It doesnt seem to be on his site anymore (if it ever was) so I cant be sure but Im fairly certain that is where this person got the idea. In fact, Im pretty sure that on this site (how to dress emo) created by Rob Dobi used to have the cutout heart shirt... http://www.dobi.nu/emo/boys.htm I know that the difference between someones tattoo and a t-shirt is huge I just thought it worth mentioning for whatever reason. Robs work is amazing and well worth checking out regardless.
All the best,
Matt
Someone tell me again why copyright is even an issue?
Update: Matt was right; here’s a shot from Dobi’s page that another reader found:
I still like the tattoo, but cancel any of my commentary about it being an original design unfortunately…
Sorry I haven’t updated much in the past few days. We’ve had a guest down here in La Paz so Rachel and I have been busier than usual, and Jordan’s internet connection is out… Anyway, I’ll start off with a cut-out heart tattoo that I really like even though it’s pretty over the top emo, and which I have no doubt will start being copied a day or two after this entry goes up.
For the record, this original (?) piece is by Ron Aytes of Three D Oils and Ink in Valparaiso, Indiana. Here’s another one I like, this one by Brett Osborne (IAM:bretticus) of Pure Body Arts in Brooklyn…
Live to Squeak, Squeak to Live
I get tattoo pictures of snakes daily, and every time I get one I think how much better of a tattoo it would be if there were some ladders thrown in. Well, thanks again to Brett (see above), my wish was answered.
Next, on IAM:nuclearsummer, vagina monsters go to war with a flying penis… tattoo courtesy of Dave Knight at Tattoo Mania in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. As far as I can tell the penis monster is winning, but war is a sticky thing and penises tend to blow up unexpectedly, so the outcum is anyone’s guess.
How about an assortment of Volkswagen tattoos? VW pride!
Yes, the last one is on his nutsack.
Finally, this slogan tattoo wouldn’t even make me look twice if I saw it on the street here in Mexico, or even in the US. However, this piece actually hails all the way from Planet Tattoo in Kiev, Ukraine, by Dmitry Mitsik… I suppose Latin Spirit is everywhere?
Copy someone’s tattoo, and you will get outed, and your peers will laugh at you next time you show your face at a convention. I realize copying of tattoos is going to happen, and there’s probably nothing that will entirely stop it, but it can’t happen in the shadows. You will be named as a plagiarist.
 Original by Cory Ferguson |
 Rip off by King of Kings |
This dirtbag even has the gall to include the photo in his online portfolio — that is, he’s using it to advertise what a good “artist” he is. Cory designed the piece from scratch for a dear friend of his. It’s an original custom creation and it reflects Cory’s skills as an artist. The cheap copy on the right reflects only their ability to copy. It’s false advertising, and puts customers at risk by effectively lying to them about the actual qualification of the “artist”.
I’d say King of Kings at least owes Cory Ferguson a royalty payment.
Hey! Brandon Swartz of Inflictions in Covina, California, you owe Tim Kern (and Amina Munster) a serious apology. If this was 1989, your shop would be burned to the ground. Lucky for you, it’s 2005, and all you’ve lost is the respect of your peers.
 Original by Tim Kern |
 Copy by Brandon Swartz |
Seriously, taking someone’s custom tattoo and copying it isn’t a compliment. It’s theft and abuse of something really personal, a kind of emotional rape that’s utterly unacceptable. Not cool at all.
Previously: Pirate Tattoos
Another roundup of poorly done kanji tattoos, caught by our friend Tian at Hanzi Smatter who runs an excellent blog on the subject of misused kanji.
 They think it means: “Sheep” Actual meaning: “Not yet, have not” (huh?) |
Want to see more? Add hanzismatter.com to your daily read.
Thanks Tian!
Today is “international talk like a pirate day“… Last year I recoded the IAM/BME community software interface to render people’s pages in pirate-talk. That didn’t go over too well with a few people who thought their pages had been hacked, so this year I’m just going to post a collection of some of the many pirate themed tattoos I’ve received over the years. I’ll start off with some classic pirate skulls:
And some more, but with various pirate slogans:
Moving on, you can never go wrong with pirate pin-ups:
And finally, a few assorted pirate themed pieces:
Arrrrr!
I’m really a big fan of the work (facial and otherwise) that “Tattoo Joe” out of Physcial Graffiti Ink in Bridgeport, Connecticut is doing (he’s the bottom right photo in this entry by the way — one of the few, if not only, Western tattoo artists I can think of with this type of facial work)… who’d have thought that Bridgeport, Connecticut was some sort of facial tattooing hub? Anyway, the world would be a more interesting — and I dare say better — place if more people went and got their faces tattooed.
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All tattoos by “Tattoo Joe”, Physical Graffiti, Bridgeport CT
The application of neo-traditional Maori and Polynesian designs on Westerners of course raises cultural appropriation issues that there’s a great deal of debate on (ie. do we have the right to borry these motifs in the first place?), but my feeling is that body art is universal and belongs to everyone, and in this modern global culture, we are a lot better off embracing each others cultures and celebrating them than saying “this is off limits and only <insert race here> can do this” — or worse yet, relagating these things to the realm of some “noble savage”. Body art must live through all people of the world and of time, and is core to the human experience.
