Cooled and Soothed
By Jordan Ginsberg • May 18th, 2009 • Category: ModBlog
Patrick, he of the most interesting and in-progress backpiece up top, writes in with the the story of how he donated his back to the good folks at Karma Tattoo Studio in Erie, Pennsylvania:
The artists at Karma Tattoo Studio wanted to do a collaboration piece. I’ve been getting tattooed at the shop since it opened a few years back. In fact, I was the first person to be tattooed at the shop once it did open. During the winter of ‘07-08, the artists at Karma began speaking about their desire to do a collaboration piece together, and I was in. They wanted to do a large area, and my back was a clean slate, so we decided on that. I pitched them some concepts I had, and they ran with it. One artist began sketching, then would pass the design on to another artist, who would then pass it on to the remaining artist. The sketch would come full circle, and go around once again making any changes. Initially, the design was supposed to run to the bottom of my buttocks. However, my back was not wide enough, so it needed to be downsized a bit. After sitting through these sessions, I’m glad it wasn’t any bigger. I don’t know if I could have handled much more.
I’ve been getting tattooed since I was 18; I’m now 23. I’ve sat well with the pain over the years. I’ve tried to get a majority of the painful areas out first—chest, ribs, stomach, etc. However, this was the worst pain I’ve ever felt from being tattooed. Having three artists at once is a very intense and very real feeling. Just the sound from their machines alone was enough to get your mind running a million miles per minute. I still have one session left until the piece is complete.
Jordan Ginsberg is the former managing editor and head writer for BME.
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This is awesome. Not only is it a fantastic piece, but a collaboration of artists from beginning to end.
Would love to see people get inspired by this and see what can come of it.
i agree with shaolin.
A wonderful, inspiring concept that led to a beautiful result.
I love the idea behind this. I don’t know if I could handle getting tattooed by three people at once though, its gotta be an interesting experience
The sound of one machine is mesmerizing, I can’t imagine three going at the same time. Also, feeling those needles going in three different areas must be incredible.
Did each artist tattoo the piece that they designed or did they chop it up geographically speaking into thirds?
This really should have more comments, as the original idea was such an interesting concept in group creativity. Not to mention that the tattoos are gorgeous as well.
That has to be one of the finest back-pieces I’ve seen. I rate the guy 100% for coping with three machines inking him at one time; I’m sure I couldn’t have handled that. Even one can be a bit ouchy sometimes.
The collaboration of three artists is a very interesting concept and I’m truly impressed at how well it’s worked out with a seamless design incorporating so many different images. I like it that there’s a lot of black ink, which goes well with his black ear-plugs.
Awesome is an overused word on here … but …it’s AWESOME !!!
Fucking beautiful tatoo, the themes that aparently have nothing to do with each other match perfectly well. congrats
oh man, getting worked on by three machines at once would SUCK but this piece is beautiful!!
i’d love to see the process of drawing this up
kudos
amazing
i keep coming back to this piece over and over. there’s something so strangely beautiful about it - if someone had shown me the different themes on separate pieces of paper, i would have sworn they would never go well together. this tattoo obviously proves me wrong! it looks so seamless, so finely “tuned”. props to the three artists for designing such a gorgeous and unique piece, and kudos to our friend for sitting through - what intense sessions they must have been!
i would i have to believe that this is probably one of the best peices i have seen in a very long time, good job sittin through it all
[...] in tandem by Gareth and Mark from Mischief Moon in Sydney, Australia. Now, last week, we featured this backpiece in which three artists worked at one—what do you all think? Would you rather three tattoo artists [...]