The seventh International London Tattoo Convention, now the most important and crowded convention in the world, will be held over the weekend of September 23/24/25 (NEXT WEEKEND, CANNOT WAIT) at Tobacco Dock. This year, the organisers are opening up even more areas, rooms and attractions than ever before, to meet the public’s inexorably increasing interest in body art.
I am excited to announce that I will be reporting from the event for Zeitgeist magazine, with the help of Papercut Pictures. Article and short film to follow, watch this space…
In the meantime here is a selection of photos from last year’s event.
Lee, Simon & Dan - Artist, Lee Simonds, Cherry Blossom, WaltonTattooing at convention
Cris Cleen is a tattoo artist who has been tattooing for nine years. His tattoo style is “turn of the century” and “European influenced.” In this beautiful short documentary, filmed and edited by Andreas Tagger, Cleen talks passionately about creating a world of beautiful things and keeping beautiful art alive. Cleen explains the way he feels about the “tattoo experience”, as close-ups of his paintings and tattoos are filmed with a soundtrack that compliments the art perfectly by Dirty Peaches.
To explore his amazing portfolio of tattoos go to criscleen.com
This tattoo encompasses everything Cleen loves in a tattoo.
From start to finish – this is the story of my beautiful new cameo tattoo.
I blogged about my inspiration a couple of months ago: Beautiful cameo tattoos. I have always found cameo and vintage jewelery extremely pretty and I used this to inspire me.
I picked Andrea Furci at The Family Business to design it for me, his art is very feminine and soft, with a traditional tattoo feel.
Here is the photo story of my cameo tattoo – from bare wrist to lovely new tattoo.
Bare wrist before the tattoo.Putting on a brave face pre-tattooThe stencilI approved the design and it got stencilled onto my wrist...
Once the tattoo is stencilled onto my wrist, I check the position in a mirror and see if I approve. I approved without hesitation, it felt right as soon as I saw it.
Now of course comes the hard bit…the pain…
The outline (it didn't hurt a bit...honest...)
How it felt
It is very difficult to describe what the tattoo process felt like, I am sure it differs from person to person…but I didn’t think my tattoo hurt – hurt is the wrong word, it just felt uncomfortable. I could feel a burning sensation on my skin, but more than that I was fascinated to see how the tattoo transformed – from stencil to outline to colour. Watching the ink go into my skin and seeing how accurately Andrea Furci could tattoo. So many intricate and delicate little details, yet never straying outside the lines. Such clean lines and vibrant colours.
During the tattoo...The tattoo with shadingno colour yet...
The grand unveiling…the beautiful tattoo with full, vibrant colour – reds, blues and warm yellows.
The final piece - my beautiful cameo tattoo by Andrea FurciPost-tattoo happinessThe tattoo is wrapped in cling film to protect it for the first night.Bandaged and ready for a beer.
Now, I would quite like Andrea to design a man in a cameo frame for my other wrist, maybe with a top hat and pipe, facing into my cameo lady.
Thanks Andrea, I can’t wait to get tattooed by you again in the future.
It has been a while since I have talked about my own ink journey…the last time may have been at the beginning of the year when I talked about strange children and sharpies. At this time I only had one tattoo (which has not yet featured on this blog). Since then I have had two tattoos, a cameo tattoo on my inner wrist and a padlock on my foot. Both are beautiful and I couldn’t be more pleased…
I am now working on some blog posts and that will show the tattoo process from start to finish…drawing, outline, shading, colour, healing and the finished piece…I hope you will find this helpful in your own decisions about what and where to get tattooed. I will also do a feature with all of my own tattoos very soon…
If anyone would like any advice just get in touch.
The seventh International London Tattoo Convention, now the most important and crowded convention in the world, will be held over the weekend of September 23/24/25 (NEXT WEEKEND, CANNOT WAIT) at Tobacco Dock. This year, the organisers are opening up even more areas, rooms and attractions than ever before, to meet the public’s inexorably increasing interest in body art.
