Things&Ink

October 2, 2015October 5, 2015

Five Best Tattooed Film Characters

Our guest blogger is hobbyist film and TV series reviewer and writer Harry Casey-Woodward:

5 best film characters with tattoos

5) Name: Jack Sparrow (sorry, Captain Jack Sparrow)
Played by: Johnny Depp
In: Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, 2003
Tattoo: A sparrow on his wrist

If you’re on the run (or sail rather) from the Royal Navy or the terrible clutches of the East India trading company, surely you wouldn’t get a certain avian tattoo on your forearm that would give a clue to your name?

4) Name: Leonard
Played by: Guy Pearce
In: Memento, 2000
Tattoo: Daily reminders all over his body

Here’s proof to your disapproving elders that tattoos can be useful. In a more interesting movie by Christopher Nolan than his Dark Knight films, Guy Pearce plays a chap searching for his wife’s murderer while suffering from short term memory loss. To combat this, he tattoos of all the things he needs to remember like clues, who he can trust and I guess daily reminders onto his body. However useful and painful the process, it’s best to keep those shopping lists short. I guess it’s quite impractical stripping off in a supermarket just to check you’ve got everything.

3) Name: Lisbeth Salander
Played by: Noomi Rapace
In: Män som hatar kvinnor or The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, 2009
Tattoo: A dragon on her back, in case you were wondering.

Lisbeth’s huge tattoo on her delicate frame is a sign of the power and strength she felt she lacked as grew up watching her father beat her mother. She is a world class hacker and all round computer goddess, but she is a troubled heroine. She is ruled legally incompetent as a child and lives under the care of a legal guardian, initially the kind hearted Holger Palmgren. When Holger suffers a stroke, he is replaced by Nils Bjurman (Peter Andersson). Nils is a heinous man to say the least. He abuses his position to extort sexual favours from Lisbeth and eventually rapes her. She catches the entire incident on film and threatens to ruin him unless he gives her full control of her life – and uses a tattoo gun to write across his belly “Jag är ett sadistiskt svin och en våldtäktsman” – I am a sadistic pig and a rapist. Lisbeth has everything her tattoo embodies – triumph over adversity and strength from pain.

2) Name: Francis Dolarhyde aka the Tooth Fairy
Played by: Ralph Fiennes
In: Red Dragon, 2002
Tattoo: Also a dragon on his back.

Probably one of the greatest tattoo identity crises. In this prequel to Silence of the Lambs, Ralph Fiennes (who has an arsenal of terrifying performances including a Nazi, a gangster and a psychotic megalomaniac wizard) portrays a serial killer who has a William Blake Biblical dragon painting tattooed all over his back. This is not just because he likes it but because he wants to become it. In his most deluded scene, he displays his mighty sexy dragon body before a captured Philip Seymour Hoffman, who is clearly terrified at the amount of days, agony and expenditure that went into that ink.

1) Name: Harry Powell
Played by: Robert Mitchum
In: The Night of the Hunter, 1955
Tattoo: The words ‘love’ and ‘hate’ tattooed on his knuckles.

For marrying a widow to get her ex-husband’s money, killing her then stalking her runaway children across the country, this devilish preacher surely wins for being the creepiest inked character in this classic film noir. His most sinister feature besides his eerie singing are the striking tattoos on his hands. One hand bears the word ‘love’, the other ‘hate’. He uses these to physically represent the struggle between the two emotions in a one-man arm wrestle. What they may actually signify is the duality of his personality, a criminal masquerading as a Christian, and perhaps in conservative 1950s America a man with tattoos was surely disreputable? Whatever the meaning behind the tattoos (if there is any, for they might be his tenth and meaning stopped mattering a while ago) and even though they are basic compared to the other tattoos in this list, they are instantly iconic and a bizarre and original character trait for 1950s cinema.

All images from IMDB

October 1, 2015

Pastel Paradise: Lemon Freckles

Toni or Lemon Freckles is a 30-year-old illustrator and blogger from Sheffield who lives in a pastel paradise of pink hair, her pugs and girl gang inspired drawings. We chatted to Toni to find out more about her fashion and artistic style, how she became a blogger and her tattoo collection…

When did you start blogging? How did you get into it? I originally started blogging around 10 years ago under a different name but Lemon Freckles is around five years old I think. At the time I was working full-time in mental health and in need of a creative outlet, blogging seemed like something I was able to do while working full-time, I didn’t really think anyone would ever read it.

What things can people expect to see on your blog? A mixture of things, I like being able to share what is happening in my world; from my latest cute find to things that inspire me. I want Lemon Freckles to be a positive place, full of colour and silliness.

Do you have a background in art? No, my degree is in mental health but I have always been a doodler. After 10 years of working in the mental health industry, I decided to take a step back and reflect on what I enjoy doing and last year I enrolled in a year long course in design. A few months ago I went self-employed full-time and it has been one of the best decisions I have made.

What inspires you? Colour and my ever so slight obsessive collecting of cute toys from my childhood. I want to bring back a little bit of that magic I left at the school gates sometime between the late 80s and early 90s. I am a firm believer that just because you’re an adult, it doesn’t mean you have to act like a grown up.

What things to do you like to draw? The more colour the better in my eyes. I love doodling toys and making characters out of everyday objects.

What medium do you use? Pen and paper, Illustrator, whatever is to hand.

How would you describe your style, both in art and fashion? I think they are both the same, eclectic. It’s all in the detail, from the Polly Pocket earrings to the denim jacket covered in patches, the more cute the better!

Can you tell us a little bit about your tattoos? Of course! I actually only got my first tattoo last year, which was a pug (a forever reminder of my two furry pug babies, Doug and Lola) and since then I have got three more; a My Little Pony, a Lefton, Miss Priss Kitty tea pot and a sewing related one. Sam Whitehead of Blind Eye Tattoo Company in Leeds has done all of mine and also has the same love of cuteness that I do, which makes her wonderful to work with.

Do you think they have to have meanings? Nothing deep and meaningful I’m afraid. I get tattoos of things I love, things that make me happy and of course, the more colour the better.

Do you have any future tattoo plans? I’ve got one later this month actually, a Roly-Poly doll, which will be going on my arm. I’m wanting to get my full arm covered in cuteness over the next year, much like my style, eclectic and cute.

September 30, 2015September 30, 2015

The Art of Sarah Howell

Australian artist, illustrator and textile designer Sarah Howell has created mixed media art pieces for over two decades. We love the way she uses photographs, illustrations and work sourced from other artists to create surreal and trippy pieces. Sarah has created campaigns for brands including Topshop, Diet Coke and Nokia.

In an interview with No Cure magazine Sarah explains that:

my art is mostly void of concept or statement, and is purely aesthetic. I like things to look beautiful rather than have a hidden message

Bird Skull Mask

Nice Kitty

Tear Tattoo

Mistake

Goddess Revival

Romance

Eve

“Buy Or Die” – Ilustrate Exhibition

2010 Paste-up Mural for Topshop, Topshop Oxford Street London
Plus Limited edition t-shirt
Acrylic, spray paint and collage
4m x 2.5m

September 29, 2015September 29, 2015

The Art of Kaethe Butcher

Kaethe Butcher is 25-year-old illustrator based in Berlin, she creates beautifully simple line drawings that explore themes of sexuality, relationships and the body. Kaethe has created an illustration titled ‘Washing out the Realisation’, especially for Things&Ink inspired by the newly released Horror Issue. We chatted to Kaethe to find out more about her style and what inspires her…

Do you have a background in art?
If you ask whether anyone in my family is an artist then no. Once my mother told me that when she was young, she wanted to do an apprenticeship as a porcelain painter and I guess she was talented, although she wanted more practise. But in the DDR (German Democratic Republic, a former state) it was difficult for her and she gave up painting. I studied. I studied fashion design at university but we didn’t draw much on the course, in the first term we had a nude class. I guess that it trained my eyes to see more aesthetic things.

Photograph of Kaethe by Robin Kater

How would you describe your style?
Erotic artwork that is melancholic and mournful.

What inspires you?
Mostly through my own heavy heart and mournful thoughts. Melodies and song lyrics inspire me. I also pick out quotes from books when I am reading, or perhaps a movie scene or little details will inspire me. Like Moonrise Kingdom or Tomm Moore’s superb and lovely animation movies – just the colours or scene compositions. Also thoughts from people around me are very important!

What medium do you use?
Pencils from 2H to 8B, fineliners and eddings and copic markers, I want to use crayons again soon.

Which has been your favourite piece that you have created?
AURYN is my favourite piece currently. And ‘We Don’t Talk About That’ is my most important one for myself.

We Don’t Talk About That

Are there any artists you admire? Do they influence your art?
Yes! Takato Yamamoto, Vania Zouravliov, I enjoyed the Vania artbook that I got from a friend so so much!. I also love Egon Schiele.

Where can people buy your art?
Original artwork can be found on my Bigcartel shop. Prints and other stuff like mobile phone cases, t-shirts or totes you’ll find on Society6 and on Juniqe.

Can you tell us about your tattoos?
I have two! On my left shoulder I have the white rabbit illustration by John Tenniel from Alice in Wonderland, and on my right thigh I have one of my own sketches. It is of a girl and a little rabbit from behind . All of them are just black line work. I have wanted a third tattoo so bad for a really long time – a sleeping lion illustration from a Grimm fable book.
I mostly like tattoos which emphasize the character of a person or have a little story or thought behind – nothing spectacular but something. I don’t like those old-fashioned, pin-up, rockabilly style tattoos very much or those IT tattoos – even if they’re looking super good. They just bored me.

AURYN

September 25, 2015

Innocent Bones Stitch

Gone are the days where anyone under the age of 80 would roll their eyes at the very thought of cross stitching. Cross stitch has become so popular that many crafters are beginning to think outside of the once constricted realms of what was deemed appropriate to cross stitch. Innocent Bones are redefining an era by providing kits that come with everything you need to create your very own fabulously rude cross stitch work of art.

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Not for the easily offended with kits that include ‘fuck,’ ‘bitch’ and ‘shit’…they are sure to bring many a laughter to any household and even Buzzfeed have jumped on the bandwagon and featured Innocent Bones in an article entitled “Accessories every sweary girl really fucking needs!”

The kits are available to buy via the Innocent Bones Etsy page here and you can also find more information on their Facebook page and Instagram as @_graceisobel