Phil's Sleeve Captures Conflict

The occasional reader might notice we don't feature a lot of full sleeves on this site, partly due to the difficulty of properly capturing the artist's work. Every once in a while, however, I see something quite good and feel I have to give it a shot.


I ran into Phil this fall at one of my local grocery stores. He shared this sleeve with us:

It was done by Wil Scherer at Sanctuary Tattoo in Portland, Maine.

Phil explained that the work is "revolved around Zen Buddhism ... the figure at the top is one of the guardians from the Emerald Temple in Thailand."

It is in conflict with another guardian at the bottom of the sleeve.

This battle between the guardians reflect the conflict in life.

Thanks to Phil for sharing this amazing sleeve with us here on Tattoosday!

This entry is ©2013 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.

Kevin's Medieval, Mystical, Musical Sleeve

The other day we saw Olivia's "Hippie Chick".

With her was Kevin, who let me photograph his sleeve:

Kevin explained that the sleeve is "a medieval and mystical, musical kind of deal, a battle of what exists and doesn't exist in your own mind."

This work was done by two artists from upstate New York: Joel Mentnor from Hyperion Tattoo in Buffalo, and Josh Avery at Davie Mac's Rock Solid Tattoos on Grand Island in the Niagara Falls area. Kevin sat for the sleeve, by his estimate, approximately twenty-five hours over a two-year period. He has about thirty-five hours of tattoo work on his canvas. [Update: this piece was previously attributed incorrectly to Bob Bieber, but Joel Mentnor confirmed that he and Josh Avery both worked on the sleeve.]

Thanks to Kevin for sharing his sleeve with us here on Tattoosday!

This entry is ©2013 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.

Olivia's "Hippie Chick"

Back in September, I met Kevin and Olivia in Penn Station. Both have tattoos and were kind enough to share their work. Today we get to appreciate Olivia's tattoo, which she described as her "hippie chick":

Olivia explained:

"I drew her myself. I draw all of my tattoos ... It's ... my inner personality brought out ... I play the keyboards. There's a hidden paintbrush in there. My name means 'peace' so I have a peace dove."

She had this tattooed by Esther at Beyond DMT in Buffalo, New York.

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

This entry is ©2013 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.

Emily's Sugar Skull Butterfly

At the end of July 2012, I bumped into Emily on the West 4th Street subway platform in Manhattan.

By her estimates, she has "about twenty" tattoos.

She offered up this stunning piece that wraps around her forearm:

Best to click on the image to see it in greater detail.

This hybrid sugar skull butterfly is a custom piece designed and tattooed by Brad Stevens at New York Adorned.

A piece by Brad appeared previously on Tattoosday here, back in August 2010.

Emily blogs over at Rougetheday.com.

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

This entry is ©2013 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.

Steven and Melissa's Friendship Tattoos

This summer outside of Penn Station, on the corner of 8th Avenue and 33rd Street, I met Steven & Melissa, who marked their friendship with matching tattoos:

This is how our discussion went:

Tattoosday: "So what's the story with that tattoo?"

Melissa: "It's a friendship tattoo..."

Steven: "Yeah, I'm a Cancer, so that's a moon, and it kind of describes our relationship, because she's an Aquarius and the moon controls water, it's a push and a pull, we balance each other out."

Melissa: "But he doesn't control me though...our first thing was that we found out that the moon controlled insanity and stuff, and we think we're really weird and crazy...that's what we were going with..."

Steven: "So a little of everything..."

Melissa: "Yeah."

You could tell they are close friends because their sentences overlapped and they seemed to be finishing each other's thoughts.

They credited the design and tattoo to an artist at NYC Kulture on St. Mark's Place in the East Village.

Thanks to Steven and Melissa for sharing their friendship tattoos with us here on Tattoosday!

This entry is ©2013 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.

Kaci Shares Her Skytree Tattoo

I met Kaci on Seventh Avenue in the fall, close to 14th Street. She was walking by me in the opposite direction and I had to ask her about the tattoo on her right leg:

Kaci told me that this is an illustration of Skytree, a character in the He-Man story.

Having absolutely no general understanding of the narrative, Kaci gave me an abbreviated version of the significance for her:

"I just really like the story, it's Skytree. He's the oldest living thing in the world and He-Man has to destroy him to save She-Ra's father ... [and is] frozen and is held captive by this dragon who's the second oldest thing in the world ... He-Man finds out that Skytree basically gives life to everything else in the world so [He-Man] refuses to cut him down and goes back to the dragon dude and is basically he didn't do it. [The Dragon says]  You're the only one that's opposed me and showed some faith in humanity so I'll release [him] anyway."

Kaci got this at Black Hive Tattoo in Jacksonville, Florida, crediting artist Gary Doyle. He's no longer on the Black Hive Tattoo site, so it appears he has moved on.

Thanks to Kaci for sharing this cool tattoo with us here on Tattoosday!

This entry is ©2013 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.

See Naomi's Tattoo: Life Doesn't Frighten Her

Well, it's a new year here on Tattoosday, and we still have leftover posts from 2012. But since it's in the 20s today in New York City, and we don't see a lot of work over the winter, I'm always happy to share posts from warmer days.

Going back to July, I was on the DeKalb Avenue subway platform in Brooklyn when I passed Naomi and had to stop and talk to her about her forearm tattoo:

Being a big fan of books, I recognized this as the cover of Maya Angelou's children's story Life Doesn't Frighten Me. Of course, while talking with Naomi, she reminded me whose art graced the cover.

The book is beautifully illustrated with the art of Jean-Michel Basquiat, a popular New York artist whose paintings exploded into popularity in the 1980s.

She told me she got this more than fifteen years ago from a tattooist named "Batman" who worked out of Sacred Tattoo at the time.

She explained, "I really like Basquiat and then I saw the cover on the book and I really liked the book and thought I have to have this done."

Thanks to Naomi for sharing her tattoo with us for the first post of a new year!

This entry is ©2013 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.