So I have a bunch of tattoos - Part 1

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I have a bunch of tattoos, but I’ve never really chatted about them or put them up online. But I’m getting a bunch of work over the next 6 months, so I figured, what the hell. After all, even if you see me in person, it’s rare that you get to see the work I’ve had done, so it’d be cool to get a peek, especially considering I have about 30 hours of work total, but most of it is under clothing.

Part of the idea for these comes from Keith Alexander, an early piercer from New York City who passed away in a biking accident a few years ago. His well-known process of documenting the koi backpiece he got is here and is worth reading. He also got some work from Dan Dimattia, a Belgian tattoo artist I consider a friend, which you can see here.

The first tattoos I got were around 10 years ago, and they were small by comparison to my current work, but still big for most people– about 2.5 hours of work each. They were done by Safwan, owner of a studio called Imago in Montreal, in February if I remember correctly. I was around nineteen and hadn’t been tattooed yet; for some reason, I waited until after I was legal to do all the rebellious stuff people usually do as teenagers.

At the time, I was pretty enamored by a dude called Tony Ciavarro who tattooed in Massachusetts. I remember Googling over and over again for work by him, thinking it was had a great sense of humor, which really appealed to me. The stuff was really cartoonish and graffiti-inspired (what they call New School), and the bright colours really hit me, too. I was broke though, so I couldn’t travel, and I had to save up for this session like crazy. I think that’s why I went with Safwan then, though all the work I got later was a totally different style than what we first did.

Anyway, I found a drawing I liked of a bunch of little demons going up someone’s back from a book I had, brought them to him, and I was like “This seems cool.” I already knew then that I wanted a lot of tattoo work, and I hung around with people that had hundreds of hours of work (two piercers, Pierre and Azl, come to mind), so it wasn’t a big deal for me to get tattooed; I’d been waiting a long time.

After two hours of work on my upper back, the result was this (yes it’s a bad photo, I’ll take more).

Now, I know it doesn’t seem like a big deal; in a sense, it isn’t. This is a tattoo I barely think about. I don’t see it, and neither does almost anyone else, almost like it doesn’t exist. But I have it, and it’s a representation of me from that age.

People ask me all the time what will happen “when I change my mind” about the tattoos I have, or when “I don’t like them anymore” or “I’m old,” and presumably, wrinkly. The reality is that, when you get tattoos, you love the shit out of them for a while, and then, you stop noticing. You still like them (assuming they’re nice work) but you aren’t in love anymore. They’re just there.

In a way, though, that’s the thing; you no longer look at the artwork, but if you’re anything like me, you think: “Damn, I like the way this looks on me,” because they’re a part of who you are. They add to something you’re (hopefully) already proud of: yourself. They’re a part of your accomplishments, part of a life well-lived where you took part in things you were proud of.

But when you do think about them, it’s a good feeling. Like while I’m writing this, I think about the times I had fondly and remember the stories around them and how I felt back then: the places I went, the people I knew and was close to, etc.

That’s when you think, “Yep, those were good times.” You have a reminder, like a photograph, but you carry it wherever you go.

Filed by Julien at 3:15 pm under random