Production Notes: May 29, 2008

I often find myself wanting to discuss ink, but don't always have the photos to accompany a post.

Despite a slow start yesterday, I ended up photographing three subjects (as of this writing), the third was on the N train.

I also provided reading material for two other tattooed people on the same train. One guy had a forearm piece with Latin words traversing his hand and extending onto one finger.

The other individual sat down net to me and had "To thine own self be true" inscribed on her right inner forearm. I was showing her the printout from this post, and she told me her inscription came from NYC Adorned.

I'm hoping both of them (hint, hint) contact me so we can feature them here on Tattoosday!

Two Fists for Tattoosday

I spotted these tattoos on the plaza outside of Borders Books at Penn Station.

He was in town visiting family and he certainly had a lot of tattoos to offer. "Thirty-nine," he answered, without hesitation when I asked him how many he had. His arms were fully-covered and he had others on his neck.

We settled on these, because it seemed easiest, and Tattoosday has never presented fists before.

All his work was done at Bayou II Tattoos in Picayune, Mississippi. He credited all his work to Chip, and said the art on his hands was custom-designed.

Thanks to the guy from Florida for sharing his work with us here on Tattoosday.

John's Other Three Tattoos

Last week, I posted the "after" version of a tattoo I spotted early last Fall. The host, John, e-mailed me the updated photos after I spotted him in at the grocery store.

He also sent me shots of his three other pieces, posted above and below.

Via e-mail, John gave me the run-down on the tattoos, all inked at Body Art Studios in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn.

"The tattoo with the knife through the heart is a memorial tattoo for my grandmother who passed away in 2000. I drew it and Peter [Cavorsi] tattooed it. It took me a few years to get it because I wanted to get the tattoo done on her birthday... October 13, but I wanted to wait for a Friday the 13th 'cause that was her lucky day."

"As for 'Cheech,' it is another memorial tattoo for my Uncle Patty, my grandmother's brother. That is why it is in red, so it looks like the blood dripping from the knife [that] wrote out his name. He got the name 'Cheech' in World War II. It was his nickname, which is weird, because we are Italian and 'Cheech' in Italian is a nickname for Frank. Both of the tattoos are on my left forearm...".

The black and gray piece is a Chinese character [kanji] with ... fire. The symbol means 'art as a skill' and the fire around it represents my passion for the art, as I am practicing to be a tattoo artist myself. It was...my first tattoo, inked by Peter in 2002/2003".

"...Last is the one on my left calf, which in Chinese means "fear no evil". I got that in 2002-2003, as well. It was tattooed in Body Art, but was done by someone who worked for Peter at the time. I think his name was Sig or Zig...".

On a side note, the guy who worked for Peter did my first tattoo, and he went by the name of "Sickie". I think we're talking about the same guy.

Thanks again to John for coming through and sending me the photos and the back stories on his tattoos!

Editor's note: John's comments are 99% verbatim. I took a little editorial liberty with some punctuation and spelling, along with an occasional edit, for the sake of clarity.

Tattoos from the Blogosphere: More of Mat's Ink

Back in April, I posted an incredible back piece that was sent to me by a comrade in the blogosphere, Mat Giordano. Revisit it here. Totally worth it.

Shortly after sending me the elephant pictures, he sent me these, to add to the mix. I thought it was time to be a good blogger and share. Full disclosure: these are in Houston, photographed and sent by someone I've never met, but have spoken to on line.

Nonetheless, it's amazing ink, and Mat is a multimedia designer, so his work is pretty interesting.


So, what's with this flower? Here's an excerpt from our chat (edited and abbreviated):

Me: What's the flower?

Mat: Sort of a mutation of a hibiscus

unrealistic color scheme

but what was in my head;
I just didn't know it until I saw Travis' stencil.

Me: did you do the design or was it a collaborative effort with Travis [the artist]?

Mat: I never design my tattoos

just ideas

I realize my place as a designer

I'm not a tattoo artist

lots of designers make the mistake of designing their own tattoos and being very adamant about what the tattoo artist should do

instead of letting them fly at what they are best at

Me: Agreed

Mat: I say "I'd sort of like this"

and say "tattoo what you think belongs there".

This was a special one for me

Me: Why special?

Mat: It was the pink-to-red gradient of the hibiscus plants that I planted in the driveway of the first home I had with ... my little boy Jack

whose name you can see on my wrist at the end.

Every morning when I'd be leaving to go create things for a living,

I'd see it open in the driveway

one on each side

so past that, being in Houston now, it's nice to look at it and remember

I was there this past weekend and all those feelings came rushing back like a tidal wave

Me: The hibiscus (maybe all flowers) can carry such emotional weight as symbols of places...I grew up in Hawai'i where the hibiscus is the state flower and to me it just represents home

Mat: Wow, so you can sort of relate how I feel about the relations of a flower symbolizing comforts of home

or symbols of anything that carry emotional weight, I suppose

Me: Absolutely, especially when they are so significant to a specific time and place.

As you can see, interesting discussion about the emotional weight behind tattoos as symbols of not only the abstract (the idea of 'home'), but of concrete places as well.

Later on, Mat elaborated : "I couldn't really understand, beyond the fact that Travis is a great friend of mine, why my mind immediately wanted those colors [in the hibiscus] he predetermined right before we started, until I realized the weight of what they meant in my subconscious, which fortunately made its way through a pretty muddy network to my conscious so I could relay it to the artist. Thankfully, Travis can read me pretty well, in turn cutting plenty of my mindless stares and utters out of the time frame."

Mat has communicated about tattoos with me on a level more cereberally than anyone I have met since Tattoosday began. He's above and beyond the "I-liked-the-art-on-the-wall" mentality, which is fine for many people.

Below is a shot of Travis Stanley, the artist at 713 Tattoo Parlour, in Houston, Texas, working on Mat's flower tattoo.

And finally, a cool shot of Mat's wrists:


Jack, as mentioned above, is his son. The name was inked by Marc da Sharc at I-Drive Tattoo in Orlando, Florida. Marc da Sharc also did the other piece, but at the aforementioned 713 Tattoo Parlour. For those unfamiliar with the design, it is the symbol for infinity. Mat specifically wanted to clarify that the placement of that symbol on his wrist "by no means was a decision based on how long he thinks he'll be around".

Thanks again to Mat for sharing his tattoos here!

Ian Jones Has Thirteen Tattoos. Here Are Four.

I saw this hannya mask outside of Penn Station and went up to talk to its host, Ian Jones, a Long Islander waiting for a train.

Despite a light rainfall, we chatted for ten minutes or so about his tattoos and the stories behind them.

Since the advent of Tattoosday, participants' reactions to the project range from total disinterestedness to moderate amusement. Ian, however, took it a notch higher, to the point of downright enthusiasm. He sounded sincere in his appreciation for the blog (and the idea behind it), and I got the impression that he would have let me take pictures of each tattoo, had time and weather permitted.

The big piece that first drew my attention was the colorful half-sleeve on his left bicep. The hanyya masks are traditional elements in Japanese tattooing styles, and he has two masks representing good and evil.


This tattoo, about ten hours worth of work so far, was done by Kristen at Artful Ink Tattoo Studio, in Bohemia, on Long Island. He noted that it was also a cover-up of a "bad sparrow and flower".

Ian says he gets the most questions about his Volkswagen logo on the inside of his right wrist.

He explains why he got an automotive emblem on such a prominent spot: he's always loved German engineering and has always had VW vehicles. His first car was a VW Eurovan, but his second car, a VW GTI 2-door hatchback, was what cemented his love of Volkswagens for life.

Ian told me how he was in his GTI when he was in a horrible crash. The other vehicle was purportedly going 100 MPH and Ian is convinced that the VW's structural shell protected him from critical injuries.

As a tribute to the GTI, and as an expression of his love of Volkswagen, he had the VW logo inked on his shifting arm (he now drives a VW Jetta) as a reminder of his survival from such a harrowing experience.

His left arm sports two tattoos:

There is Long Island on the forearm and a star on his inner wrist. The star was inked the same time as the VW logo to provide balance, but it grew to take on a more important meaning. It's a reminder symbol about a friend of his who is in the Marines.

The VW and star were inked by his friend and bandmate Tony Coffins at Resonance Tattoo, also on Long Island (Center Moriches). Ian and Tony are in a band, Phoenix Rise, together. See their MySpace page here and listen to them play.

The tattoo of Long Island, which Ian admits is not done that well (although I would say at least looks like Long Island), is nonetheless, still near and dear to his heart. Ian was adopted when he was a baby, and he feels that he could have ended up anywhere, and Long Island was his home. He is proud to be a Long Islander, and thus wears this as a badge of honor.

Thanks to Ian for his enthusiasm for Tattoosday, and let's hope we see more of his ink here in the future!

John's Koi: Then and Now

It was only a matter of time.

I wondered when, just buy the nature of my talking to so many tattooed people, I would approach someone about Tattoosday, having already featured them on the blog.

The answer: seven months.

Here's an excerpt from October 2007:



Does that look familiar? I wrote in October 2007:

The first piece is a classic koi tattoo, done on the front of the calf. There is a dragon on the back of the leg but it is not finished yet, as color still needs to be added.

The host, John, is from the Bay Ridge area and had his koi inked at Body Art Studios on 3rd Avenue. We know the artist, Peter Cavorsi, who also runs the shop, because he is responsible for one of mine and three of my wife's pieces. I strongly recommend his shop if you live in southwest Brooklyn. His shop is clean and he does very nice work, as you can see from John's koi.

Koi are a traditional part of Japanese tattoo, and are very common subjects n body art because they represent good fortune. Despite their being regular subjects, they seldom are ever one in the same. Like snowflakes, they tend to differ from body to body, and unlike tribal pieces, I don't think I could ever get bored of koi tattoos.

John estimated that this large leg piece, including the dragon on the back of the leg, not pictured and not yet colored, took 13 hours so far. A lot of people don't realize how much time goes into elaborate pieces like these. On shows like Miami Ink, a ten-hour project can be compressed to five minutes of screen time.

Well, last Sunday, I saw the finished work, not realizing that John had been here previously. I handed him a flier at the grocery store, and he reminded me who he was. He was busy with groceries, but he promised me he'd send photos of the finished work. He estimates that Peter had spent an additional nine hours on the piece since October, making it about 22 hours in total.

That's one thing about the whole "_____ Ink" television experience, the work is edited down so much that many people don't realize how much effort goes into the large quality pieces.

And of course, John came through with these updated shots:





Thanks to John for sharing his finished leg piece with us! Stay tuned!! He also sent me photos of his other tattoos, which will be featured in a later post.

All Aboard! Susan's Train Tattoo Honors Her Son

I ran into Susan, walking south on 3rd Avenue last Saturday. She sports nine tattoos in all, but the one that jumps out at you is the piece above on her lower left calf.

I have yet to master the art of photographing a wrap-around piece, so bear with this one (although I think I did ok).

First the story behind the ink. Susan is a proud parent and, like most parents, her body art reflects her love of her child. She has been getting tattooed since her son was 3 (now he's 10) and he has even collaborated on designing some of her work.

If memory serves, her son's name is Nicholas, which explains the "N" on the locomotive.


He is a HUGE fan of trains, to the extent that he knows subway lines and is adept at giving directions and the MTA routes. Thus, the central element of the piece.

In front of the train is a railroad crossing signpost


and at the back is the caboose,

complete with hearts and a Pac-Man symbol to reflect her son's love of video games.

His love of rainbows, as well, is reflected by the multi-colored arc over the train. The piece is completed by the rising sun (a play on "son").


The end result is a vibrant, wonderful piece of body art which is poignant and visually-appealing.

This tattoo, along with all her other work, was inked be Peter Cavorsi at Body Art Studios in Bay Ridge. Peter inked my guitar-cherub (at the bottom of the page) and has appeared on Tattoosday many times before (click here to see the various pieces).

Thanks to Susan for bringing some colorful maternal ink to us here at Tattoosday!