Tattoos: Black and Gray

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Senin, 31 Agustus 2015

Christina's Incredible Sideshow

A couple weeks ago, I was on the C train early in the morning, headed to Penn Station, when a woman got on with incredible tattoos.

We didn't have much time to talk, and it was rush hour, but I did pass her my card, inviting her to send me photos.

A few hours later, on Amtrak to Albany, my email pinged and I was delighted to receive an email from Christine, not only sending me pictures of the tattoo I had admired on the subway, but some work that I wouldn't have been able to appreciate in person.

First off, the tattoo on her lower leg:

This tattoo of a snake charmer was done earlier this year at Kings Avenue Tattoo on the Bowery in Manhattan. The artist was the visiting Xam the Spaniard (Instagram here), who is based out of London.

Christina's other work was also done at Kings Avenue by other amazing artists. Behold:

I'll let Christina explain:

"My most significant tattoo is probably the bearded lady from Sarah Carter (she actually went by Sarah Schor then, was living in the States at the time, and started at the Kings Ave shop just after it opened its second location on the Bowery).

I was extremely naive about tattooing (as most people generally are when they nervously walk into a shop for the first time). I think I sent a really long, meaningful letter to Kings Ave before going in. Pretty cutesy/embarrassing stuff. Anyway, the reason this tattoo is the most significant one I have is because Sarah's work made me fall in love with tattooing. I admired her as an artist so much (serious girl crush—pretty sure she thought I was insane because I couldn't even respond to her in complete sentences) (part of this, honestly, is more about the whole tattoo-on-the-ribs thing though) (and people say it all the time, but that shit is no joke).

Before seeing her portfolio and getting tattooed by her, I had no connection to tattooing. None of my friends were into it, and I think we all know how difficult it can be finding artists and just generally knowing what you're looking at if nobody is there to show you. After, I was hooked. Especially since humble yet grossly talented artists like Mike [Rubendall] and Grez also added to my first real experience in a shop and made it a positive one. Grez in particular has become one of my favorite people just generally ever. Collecting from different artists is important to me, but if every single one of my tattoos were done by him, I'd be totally fine with it.

Sarah's bearded lady was the first of many black and grey sideshow performers I have on my body. My entire right leg will be a cohesive piece in time, with different girl head performers from different artists. So far, it's Sarah, Grez, Xam, and Rose Hardy. In time, I'm hoping for Val Vargas, Chris Conn, Jack Rudy, and Tim Hendricks. We'll see how that all pans out."

Grez is responsible for the sword swallower and fire eater, which he tattooed in 2013.

Thanks to Christina for sending along her phenomenal sideshow tattoos!

If you are seeing this on another website other than Tattoosday, without attribution, please note that it has been copied without the author's permission and is in violation of copyright laws. Please feel free to visit http://tattoosday.blogspot.com and read our original content. Please let me know if you saw this elsewhere so I contact the webmaster of the offending site and advise them of this violation in their Terms of Use Agreement.

Senin, 03 Agustus 2015

Stacy Shares Some Amazing Work from Kings Avenue Tattoo (NYC Tattoo Convention)

I'm still savoring the amazing tattoos I spotted in June at the NYC Tattoo Convention, like this work on Stacy:

This amazing sleeve features work by two of the many extremely talented artists at Kings Avenue Tattoo, Rose Hardy and Justin Weatherholtz.

Rose also did this stunning unicorn on Stacy's other arm:

Thanks to Stacy for sharing her amazing tattoos with us here on Tattoosday!

Rabu, 01 Juli 2015

Merette's Sleeve Stuns With Its Beauty

On the last day of May, I met Merette, walking on 4th Avenue in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn.

I'll be honest, I spotted her fifty yards away and stopped dead in my tracks, because I knew she had an incredible tattoo sleeve. Some work you know is great, even before you can see the details.

Thankfully, she let me take pictures of her amazing black and gray sleeve. Here's hoping these shots do justice to the work:

Merette credited artist Soner Turan, formerly of Citizen Ink Tattoo in Brooklyn, and now at Bang Bang Tattoos in Manhattan.

This beautiful work features roses, sunflowers, and a half-skull, half-face with a pop of color in the one green eye.

Thanks to Merette for sharing her stunning ink with us here on Tattoosday!

Rabu, 24 Juni 2015

Jackie's Van Helsing Tattoo (NYC Tattoo Convention)

I met Jackie outside of the Da Vinci Tattoo booth at the New York City Tattoo Convention earlier this month and she shared this awesome work on her arm:

Jackie credited this work to an artist from China named Po Po, who did the work at the Saint James location of Tattoo Lou's on Long Island, New York.

Jackie explained that the work is inspired from the film Van Helsing.

Thanks to Jackie for sharing her work with us here on Tattoosday!

Selasa, 19 Mei 2015

Emma's Tattoo for Her Faith

Yesterday afternoon, while walking to the subway through Bowling Green park, I met a couple of Korean tourists after they stopped to ask me if the National Museum of the American Indian was closed (it was).

I noticed that one of the women, Emma, had a tattoo on her thigh and I asked if I could take a photo for Tattoosday. She consented:

She told me "I got it for Jesus ... because I am a Christian."

It's a pretty cool variation on the standard Jesus with the crown of thorns, in black and grey, with a rose added at the bottom.

She got this at Wild Rose Tattoo in Seoul, Korea.

Thanks to Emma for sharing her tattoo with us here on Tattoosday!

Minggu, 03 Agustus 2014

A Mermaid Shares a Tattoo

You rarely see me on Tattoosday, but the stranger who took a photo with my phone did some funky multiple-frame picture taking that generated this gif.

Incidentally, I'm standing with Kristen who posed for a ton of photos at the Coney Island Mermaid Parade, as she was part of the group that put the whole event together.

When I mentioned Tattoosday, Kristen was kind enough to share a tattoo on her thigh that was below her shimmering mermaid skirt:

She credited this cool tattoo to her boyfriend, Joe Khay at Citizen Ink in Brooklyn. Joe also designed this year's Mermaid Parade poster.

Kristen explained that her leg has a death theme, thus the skull and the crow, a bird often thought to carry souls within them. The tattoo has a greater significance for her, as she explained:

"It's actually what got me and my boyfriend together ... it's kind of a love story behind it. The tattoo got us together ... I was going to a different artist at the same shop and then I decided, 'Hi, I'm going to go with him for one of these tattoos' ... it was out of his element, he doesn't really do much realism, he does more neo-traditional tattoos so I kinda brought him out of his element, expanding ever since and it brought us together - it's eight months later."

Thanks to Kristen for sharing her cool tattoo with us here on Tattoosday!

If you are seeing this on another website other than Tattoosday, without attribution, please note that it has been copied without the author's permission and is in violation of copyright laws. Please feel free to visit http://tattoosday.net and read our original content. Please let me know if you saw this elsewhere so I contact the webmaster of the offending site and advise them of this violation in their Terms of Use Agreement.

Minggu, 01 Juni 2014

Lexy’s Chrysanthemum Sprouts from a Poem

I was leaving my office building last week on Broad Street, when a woman named Lexy walked by with this great thigh tattoo:

I caught up to her, introduced myself and she agreed to share her ink with us here.

This piece was done by Alejandro Lopez, who is based in Pasadena, California, but works out of Addiction NYC when he's in the Big Apple.

When I asked her if she originally went to Alejandro for the chrysanthemum, she said that actually, she
had gone to him for this tattoo on her ribs:

“This is a poem,” she explained, “and I told [Alejandro] the meaning of the poem, and he reached out
to me and said, You know, I really like the poem, it resonated with me and he asked if he could expand
on it … And we sat down and talked about what the meaning was for me and he created this piece [the
chrysanthemum] based on what it meant to me.”

She indicated that the poem is Korean in origin, and it is in her grandmother’s handwriting. It turns
out that Lexy’s grandma was a professional calligrapher in Korea, and the red boxes are actual
representations of her grandparent’s pen names, or signatures, in Korean. How cool is that?

She elaborated a little more on the meaning of the poem:

“The poem itself is talking about whether you live or die as a nameless wildflower or a famous rose, it’s up to you, so you basically take control of your destiny, but [should] also have compassion for those who have no control … it also says something about the day that you’re born is the day that you die.”

Lexy also told me she was born in the year of the snake, which is why she has a cobra tattoo. I didn't think much of it at the time, as I didn't see a snake here.

When I was writing up this post, however, and looked at Alejandro's Instagram page, it all made sense. After getting his permission, along with Lexy's, I am happy to share the whole work-in-progress which, for obvious reasons, I never saw on Broad Street:

Photo Courtesy of Alejandro P. Lopez via http://instagram.com/alejandropaivalopez

Thanks to Lexy for sharing her wonderful tattoo with us here on Tattoosday! Thanks, as well, to Alejandro Lopez for sharing his Instagram collage so we could see his work in its full scope.

Minggu, 17 November 2013

Jeff Shares Some Amazing Work by Caesar Tattoo

Last Sunday, I met a guy named Jeff at my local laundromat, where I happen to meet a lot of the contributors to Tattoosday, it seems.

Jeff has a ton of work, including neck tattoos and some amazing black and gray sleeves. Turns out tattoos were created by Caesar, an amazing artist who works out of New York City.

He allowed me to grab a few samples of his work:

And this spine running down the length of his arm:

Unfortunately, these photos really don't do the work justice, but I was able to find some of the work on his Facebook page here.

You can check out more of this amazing artist's portfolio at Caesar Tattoo in Manhattan's East Village. Our friends at Needles & Sins ran a short profile of Caesar here. Jeff even told me that some of his work has ended up in one of Marisa Kakoulas' black and gray tattoo compendia.

You can see an even more extensive collection of Caesar's work on his Facebook page here.

Thanks to Jeff for sharing his work with us here on Tattoosday!

Selasa, 04 Juni 2013

A Trio of Roses on Anna, in Memory of Amada, by Nikko Hurtado

The Monday after the New York City Tattoo convention last month, I was a bit sad, because I knew that finding quality tattoo work like that which I saw at Roseland Ballroom was going to be a lot more challenging.

I was mulling this over while standing outside of my local laundromat in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, when I noticed a woman in front of Starbucks, across the street. She had an armful of black-and-gray ink, so I wandered over to introduce myself, and wow, was I in for a treat.

The woman's name was Anna, and she had lived in Los Angeles, where she had been tattooed by the amazingly talented Nikko Hurtado. In addition to some portraits, he had also inked these roses on her upper arm:

Amada, which means dearly loved, was Anna's grandmother, who loved roses, and who passed away around the time that she got the tattoo. There are three of the flowers, because that is Anna's lucky number.

As mentioned above, these were done by Nikko Hurtado, who works out of Black Anchor Collective in Hesperia, California. Just look at this detail in the work:

Thanks to Anna for sharing these lovely roses with us here on Tattoosday!

Jumat, 24 Mei 2013

Jeffrey's Jimi Hendrix Portait (at the NYC Tattoo Convention)

I met Jeffrey at this year's New York City Tattoo Convention last weekend, and he shared the above tattoo, one of a dozen famous portraits he has adorning his body.

That is, of course, Jimi Hendrix.

Jeffrey told me, "I just love black and gray portraits," and that the shading was so intense on this piece, that at one point he passed out in the middle of getting it, which took about nine hours to complete.

He credited the artist Kris Busching at Undead Ink in Oceanside, New York.

Thanks to Jeffrey for sharing this amazing portrait with us here on Tattoosday!

Selasa, 27 November 2012

Rocco Shares Some Work by Grez

Our previous post featured a tattoo I spotted on Cristine at the Mermaid Parade back in June. Cristine's brother Rocco was also in attendance, and he was kind enough to share this piece on his inner left arm:

Rocco credited this to Grez at Kings Avenue Tattoo. He did this out on Long Island in the Massapequa shop, but now works out of their Manhattan shop on the Bowery. Grez's work has been seen several times before on Tattoosday, including most recently here and here. You can also clcik on "Grez" in the tags at the bottom of the post to see more of his work that's been on the site.

Thanks to Rocco for sharing this great tattoo with us here on Tattoosday!

This entry is ©2012 Tattoosday.

If you are seeing this on another website other than Tattoosday, without attribution, please note that it has been copied without the author's permission and is in violation of copyright laws. Please feel free to visit http://tattoosday.blogspot.com and read our original content. Please let me know if you saw this elsewhere so I contact the webmaster of the offending site and advise them of this violation in their Terms of Use Agreement.