SOME THOUGHTS ON TATTOO AND ART

Over 20 years ago I was tattooed in Fortitude Valley’s Fiveways building, affectionately known as ‘sin triangle’. The location of the tattoo shop, nestled among the brothels, conveyed a strong sense of the location of tattoo in our culture. Tattoo was still a deviant practice located among the dens of iniquity on the fringes of society. Today, Fortitude Valley is home to a tattoo studio that is also an art gallery and espresso bar. It is part of the revamped Fortitude Valley, a place of cafes, chic clubs and boutique stores (and many tattoo shops). Fortitude Valley has been gentrified, as has the symbolic neighbourhood of tattoo. Tattoo has moved from its position on the fringes of society to centre stage, and at the same time moved closer towards the realm of art. In this introduction I present my thoughts on this movement.

Let us begin with a brief history of tattoo. But which history of tattoo should we examine?

Tattoo has existed in almost all societies at one time or another,1 so it is possible to write many different histories of tattoo (see Hesselt van Dinter2 for a selection). However, it has been the Western3 history of tattoo that has most influenced discussions of tattoo in relation to art, so it is with this history that I am primarily concerned.

The urge to decorate the body is as old as our species. Precisely when in Western history such decorations became permanent is a matter of debate. Skin, in most cases, is impermanent. However, on rare occasions extreme conditions will preserve skin, allowing us a window on the history of body decoration. The earliest definitive evidence of tattoo comes from ‘Ötzi the Iceman’, Europe’s oldest mummy (born c. 3300 BCE) who was preserved by the extreme cold of the Ötzal Alps (on the border between Italy and Austria). Other evidence suggests that tattoo was practised much earlier than this. For instance 12,000 year-old bowls with traces of pigment and sharpened flint instruments possibly used for tattooing were found in the Grotte des Fées (Fairy Grotto) in Châtelperron, France.2

For at least five millennia, tattoo, the puncturing of the skin to insert pigment, has been a practice of the West. However, the Western practice of tattoo has not been continuous as there were periods when tattoo was absent. These breaks led to times when tattoo was ‘rediscovered’. In short, the Western history of tattoo is not purely a matter of continuous practice, nor is it solely a matter of importation, but rather it is a complicated matter of convergence and reinforcement.1

The ancient groups of the British Isles, such as the Picts, practised extensive tattooing.4 Occupying Roman soldiers adopted the practice and tattoo continued in Rome until, in the third century, Emperor Constantine banned tattoo after his conversion to Christianity.4 Centuries later Anglo-Saxon nobility were decorated with religious tattoos or devotions to loved ones before the practice was again banned by the Church from the eighth century.4 While there is some tenuous evidence of tattoo surviving on the fringes of Christian Europe,1 it was not until the Crusades (from the late eleventh to the thirteenth centuries), that Westerners were tattooed in significant numbers. “Crusaders had themselves marked with the crucifix or other religious symbols to insure a Christian burial should they die in a foreign land”.4 Until the eighteenth century, this form of religious tattooing was the only form of tattooing performed in Western societies.4

The modern history of tattoo begins with the voyages of Captain James Cook in the South Pacific (1768-1779). Cook introduced the Tahitian word ‘ta-tu’ (which soon became ‘tattoo’), meaning ‘to strike’ or ‘to mark’, to the English language through his description of Tahitian practices.5 Pacific tattoo was briefly described by earlier explorers, but it was not until the return of Cook’s Endeavour in 1771 that tattoo really entered into modern European consciousness.6 Sailors and officers of the Endeavour received tattoos from Tahitians to commemorate their adventures stimulating a tradition of maritime tattooing (which continues to this day). On his second voyage to the Pacific, Cook returned to England with a heavily tattooed Tahitian prince who was exhibited as an object of great curiosity to members of the British upper class.4 He was the first of a series of tattooed people on display in Western aristocratic circles at the end of the eighteenth century.4 By the 1850s a number of heavily tattooed Europeans were making a living exhibiting themselves to the public and medical associations, initiating a lively tattoo fad in Europe.4 By the end of the nineteenth century the fad of tattoo was being felt amongst the highest European social classes with individuals such as Tsar Nicholas II and Winston Churchill becoming tattooed.

In Australia, tattoo has been practised since colonisation.7 Estimates suggest that as many as one third of convicts arriving to Australia in 1831 were tattooed.8 These working-class men and women were tattooed with a relatively narrow range of symbols such as their own or other’s names or initials, anchors, mermaids, hearts, stars, and the crucifixion. Over the nineteenth century, Australians were exposed to the tattoo practices of the Maori, Pacific Islanders and Japanese pearl divers resulting in Australians becoming gradually accustomed to tattoo.9 There are little records of tattoo from this time, perhaps because Australians “slowly absorbed”9 the practice rather than it becoming a more sudden and notable fad as was the case in Europe and America.

The tattoo fad of Europe crossed the Atlantic by the late nineteenth century, but by the early twentieth century tattoo lost favour with the North American elite who began to consider it vulgar.4 Tattoo was culturally downgraded and became a practice of the lower classes. The downturn in acceptance of tattoo in Europe and America was given academic weight by the theories of Italian criminologist Cesare Lombroso who suggested that the tattooed were not civilised and prone to criminality.10 Interestingly, it was about this time that tattoo became increasingly popular among North American prisoners.6

In early twentieth-century North America the first tattooed people appeared in circuses and sideshows and were presented as vicious, savage and even subhuman freaks.11 From this time until the 1960s tattoo existed on the fringes of respectable society. Those who were tattooed were predominantly working-class men such as servicemen and seamen, prisoners and members of the newly formed outlaw motorcycle clubs. They were tattooed by other working-class men who worked in tattoo shops located in places of poverty.11 Tattoo shops relied on passing trade and thus had eye-catching store fronts.12 Usually a small and complete tattoo was applied by a tattooist, and later another small, complete tattoo would be applied elsewhere on the body by a different tattooist. The inevitable result of prolonged tattooing was a chaotic collage of discrete and unconnected elements, often lacking in aesthetic value.9

Tattoos at this time were characterised by a heavy black outline and the use of limited colours (black, red, green, brown, yellow and occasionally white).12 The tattoo designs were standardised and formulaic. There was a narrow range of stock designs, and unique pieces were rare. Customers chose from sheets of ‘flash’ (sheets of standard designs usually with prices attached) which tattooists displayed on the walls of the parlour or in books. Designs were largely maritime and military (e.g. pin-up girls, nautical stars, anchors, ships, swallows, and mermaids) and Americana (e.g. eagles and flags). The tattoos of the bikers introduced a more mischievous and frightening element to tattoo (e.g. skulls), and an increasing Japanese influence through the work of people like Sailor Jerry introduced symbols such as dragons to the repertoire.

The tattoo renaissance

From the 1960s movements such as the punk, hippy, new age, women’s and gay liberation movements encouraged people to think of their bodies and their adornment in new ways. The increasing popular appreciation of other cultures opened symbolic doors to the West. The stage was set for changes to the practice of tattoo.

The dramatic changes that resulted were so significant that it has been termed the ‘tattoo renaissance’.13 A feedback relationship was initiated when more affluent, older, educated, middle-class, and artistically sophisticated individuals, many of whom were women, began to be tattooed. These new groups demanded more artistic tattooing which spurred changes in the practice which in turn encouraged a wider segment of the population to become tattooed, who demanded more changes to tattoo, and so on.

Customers began to demand more unique tattoo designs, and gradually custom tattoos (designs created by the artist in consultation with the customer) began to replace tattoos that were stencilled from flash. As a result of changing demands tattoo began to breed a new generation of practitioners. The new breed was more likely to be university or art-school trained and to prioritise artistic concerns over financial. They began to be selective and would only tattoo images that they felt matched their creative vision. Less ‘walk-ins’ were tattooed and increasingly tattoos were applied by appointment. Tattoos began to be priced by the hour rather than by the piece.

The custom tattoos created were often large pieces and careful consideration was given to their placement on the body so that they complemented the shape and movement of the body part. Placement was important as individuals began to think more about tattoos as an ongoing project rather than as isolated instances. Tattoo projects were often planned (sometimes meticulously) far into the future.

During the renaissance tattoos became much more unified. Backgrounds began to be used to join tattoos together. Body parts started to become unified tattoo scenes and terms such as ‘back job’ (referring to a tattoo that covers the entire back) and ‘sleeve’ (referring to a tattoo that covers the entire arm) became more common, particularly in the 1990s.9 Part of this more unified aesthetic was due to the increased tendency of customers to return to the same tattoo artist and establish an ongoing relationship. Talk of tattoo ‘collectors’ became more common as individuals collected tattoos from certain prized artists, sometimes travelling internationally to do so.

Tattoos in general became more detailed and three-dimensional with the beginnings of photorealism in tattoo. The range of symbols employed in tattoos became much broader as a result of the increase in unique, custom pieces. New styles of Western tattooing, such as tribal (bold, black designs reminiscent of non-Western tattoo styles) became very popular.

The number of tattoo colours available increased dramatically during the renaissance. Prerenaissance tattoos consisted of only about 5 or 6 colours: black, red, green, brown, yellow and occasionally white.12 At the start of the renaissance Sailor Jerry Collins introduced a good blue and purple although these were initially only in the hands of a few artists.12 During the renaissance new colours were produced until in the 1990s the colour range had expanded to include “nearly every hue generally available in the painter’s repertoire”.12 During the renaissance the black outline which had previously been a defining feature of tattoo began to be omitted from some tattoos. Images from fine artists such as van Gogh and Dali began to be etched on skin.

In what I believe to be the peak of the renaissance, the 1990s, tattoo began to increase its cultural and aesthetic legitimacy. The term ‘body art’ entered into popular usage and was increasingly employed by the mainstream media to describe tattoo. From the mid-1990s tattoo art exhibits began to be held in the highly influential New York art world, and in 1996 the National Museum of American Art (Smithsonian Institute) added tattoo design work to its permanent collection14 indicating that tattoo has attained a certain level of aesthetic-cultural legitimacy.15 In 2000 the Australian museum held an exhibition exploring ‘body art’.

The cultural upgrading of tattoo was reflected not only in the use of the term ‘body art’ to describe tattoo, but also in other changes to our language. ‘Tattooists’ began to be referred to as ‘tattoo artists’. Tattoo ‘shops’ or tattoo ‘parlours’ began to be referred to as tattoo ‘studios’. Tattoo began to be discussed as art, displayed as art, and was for the first time given serious consideration by academics.

Post-renaissance tattoo

Twenty-first century tattoo has in many ways continued the trends of the tattoo renaissance, but in other ways it has involved a backlash against these trends. Because of this, and the massive increase in the mainstreaming of tattoo in the twenty-first century, I suggest that at approximately the turn of the century, tattoo entered a ‘post-renaissance’ phase.

During the late twentieth century, thanks to the processes of cultural upgrading described previously, tattoo began to lose some of its cultural baggage. In the twenty-first century, we have seen unprecedented normalisation of tattoo. Tattoo (to a certain extent at least) has been mainstreamed. It has become much more common for celebrities (e.g. actors, musicians, athletes) to be visibly tattooed. There have been numerous reality TV shows on tattoo created that have emphasised the tattooed as normal, middle-class people with meaningful body art. The media no longer only employ images of the tattooed to indicate deviance, but also to indicate a new norm. For example, images of the tattooed are used to sell all manner of things such as underwear, perfume, painkillers, frying pans, energy, supermarkets, and even financial institutions, indicating that at least a large segment of the population are now expected to identify with the tattooed. Indeed some Australian government brochures aimed at youth even feature tattooed individuals.

Since the turn of the century tattoo has spread to the broadest cross-section of the community ever, crossing gender and class boundaries, until individuals of every demographic are now tattooed.16 I myself have had the pleasure of talking to many tattooed people, from punks to public servants, from outlaw bikers to police, from metal-heads to senior clergy.

In the twenty-first century in some ways we have continued the processes initiated in the tattoo renaissance, and as a result tattoo has been brought closer to the realm of art.

There are some who are designing and placing their tattoos with more concern for aesthetics than ever. There are some artists who are creating impressionist, pointillist, cubist and art nouveau tattoo designs. Galleries and museums are now exhibiting both photographic reproductions and living samples of exemplary tattoo art.4 Some tattoo artists are working in other mediums such as paint, and display canvases on their studio walls and in tattoo magazines.

Over the last five years tattoo studios that are also art galleries have emerged indicating that tattoo has achieved a new level of culturalaesthetic legitimacy. Tattoo studios are also popping up in upper-class suburbs. One studio I know of is so exclusive that they won’t give their exact address until they approve your desired tattoo and agree to tattoo it. The highly visible tattoo storefront of the pre-renaissance has been replaced with an invisible storefront. No more walk-ins, but rather a clientele carefully selected by a discerning artist.

But twenty-first century tattoo seems also to involve a backlash against the tattoo renaissance, and a symbolic return to times when there was a much larger gap between tattoo and art. In the twenty-first century there was a distinct drop in the popularity of tribal tattoo, and a resurgence in popularity of ‘old school’, pre-renaissance tattoo designs such as maritime and military tattoos (e.g. pin-ups, swallows, nautical stars, anchors, ships), Americana (e.g. eagles, flags), and black and grey designs (reminiscent of gang or prison tattoos e.g. spider’s web on the elbow). Sheets of flash of these pre-renaissance style designs are making a comeback in some tattoo studios and magazines. There has been a return, in some modern tattoo projects, to the narrow range of symbols employed in pre-renaissance tattoo. There has also been a return to a pre-renaissance aesthetic in terms of placement. Many of these ‘old school’ tattoo projects seem less unified than the tattoos of the renaissance (in particular the tattoos of the 1990s). A sleeve today can be made up of a dozen or more separate designs applied in a seemingly haphazard way with no background to unify them. The result is a pre-renaissance style ‘chaotic collage’.

In some cases deliberate efforts are made to replicate pre-renaissance tattoos by employing, for example, a heavy black outline, a basic repertoire of colours such as red, blue and green and a largely two dimensional design consisting of one part black, one part colour and one part skin. However, it seems that in many cases it is important that the pre-renaissance symbolism is modernised. For instance ‘new school’ tattoos are tattoos of pre-renaissance subject matter but done in a modern way, such as with more detail, a three dimensional appearance, a greater range of colours, and bolder shading and transitions between colours.

China b.1971

The miniature long march [detail] 2002 - 2005

Type C photograph on paper, 23 sheets: 75.5 x 55 cm (each)

Acc. 2007.009.001-023

Purchased 2007. The Queensland Government’s Gallery of Modern Art Acquisitions Fund

Collection: Queensland Art Gallery

Image courtesy: Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art

Today

Today, tattoo is more complicated and varied than ever. The legacy of the tattoo renaissance is still being felt and issues like originality, placement and unification are paramount in some tattoo projects. In other tattoo projects the post-renaissance ‘old school’ aesthetic dominates and a narrower range of symbols are employed resulting in similarity between tattoo projects. Tattoo symbolism appears to be simultaneously broadening and narrowing.

Very recently there has been some evidence of a return of tribal tattoo, albeit with a modern twist. With the return of tribal it seems that tattoo practices are currently drawing on the entire modern history of Western tattoo: from colonialism through the pre-renaissance ‘rebel’ and ‘working-class’ eras,11 to the renaissance and post-renaissance eras. It seems tattoo is performing a kind of postmodern reflection on its own history. Tattoo has moved across ethnic boundaries, gender boundaries and class boundaries. It appears to be a time of free play with all that has come before.

I believe that it is precisely this reflexive phase of tattoo that has attracted contemporary artists towards employing tattoo symbolism in their art. Through tattoo they are given fertile ground to problematise boundaries. Employing tattoo symbolism allows them to draw on a complex history of cultural appropriation, of traversing class and gender boundaries, of reinvention.

Tattoo and art

Over time, tattoo has been increasingly discussed as art, but there remains some resistance to defining tattoo as art, at least in some circles. Why is this the case?

I believe that there were several important changes to the practice of tattoo during the renaissance that encouraged people to begin considering tattoo as art. Indeed the peak of the renaissance (1990s) coincides with the beginnings of tattoo’s aesthetic-cultural legitimacy. Perhaps the most important change was the shift from flash to custom and the broadening of the range of symbols employed. There was also an increase in technical proficiency (such as the ability to produce detailed, three dimensional images in a range of colours), and a concern with placement so that tattoos complemented each other and the body part. All of these things, I believe, moved tattoo closer to the realm of art.

However, in the twenty-first century we have seen some evidence of a return to flash, and many tattoos drawn from a very limited repertoire of symbols. We have also seen a return to basic styles of tattoo with heavy black outlines, little detail, and simple use of colour. In some tattoo projects placement seems to be haphazard and not determined by aesthetic concerns. Do these changes make tattoo less artistic? While original, or singular works are more likely to be defined as art,4 is there any reason that art cannot draw on a limited range of symbols?

Today, sheets of flash, or more commonly images from the internet or magazines, are used for tattoo inspiration. As I understand it the image is almost always changed, at least slightly, before being tattooed. How much does an image need to differ from another for it to be considered unique and original? Do tattoos need to be technically complex to be considered art? Can art not be simple? Do tattoos have to be unified and coherent to be art? Does the placement of the tattoo on the body always have to be painstakingly thought through to be considered art, or can it be more spontaneous?

Regardless of the answers to these questions, there are other factors that impact on our ability to define tattoo as art. There is the difficulty of displaying — and harder yet, selling — a work that eats, sleeps and ultimately dies.17 Aside from the possibility of displaying skins in galleries it is difficult to overcome the problems of display and longevity. The issue of selling tattoo art is even more problematic. However, other practices with a limited lifespan and that are difficult to display or sell have been defined as art, for example process and conceptual art. So is there any reason that tattoo cannot be considered art?

There is one good reason why tattoo has not achieved widespread acceptance as art, and that is class. “As folk art whose iconography has long been linked to the military, prison culture and alternative lifestyle subcultures, Western-style tattooing has remained a resolutely low-brow medium attracting little institutional interest.”17

The class of those who have produced and collected tattoos has led to value judgments about tattoos as art. But with the gentrification, or the aesthetic-cultural upgrading, of tattoo that has been occurring since the 1960s we are making strides towards ridding tattoo of this cultural baggage.18 A different class of people has begun to produce and collect tattoos19 and this is increasing the likelihood that tattoo will be accepted as art.

At this point in time tattoo has achieved a ‘quasilegitimate’ status as art.15 Tattoo has been granted a degree of aesthetic-cultural legitimacy, but it is yet to be exhibited in primary art museums as ‘high’, ‘fine’ or ‘legitimate’ art.15 At the moment tattooists have to also work in other mediums to be considered artists, but the day when tattooists are recognised as artists for their tattoo work alone is, as Dr Lakra17 states, “really close”.

Tattoo is a technique for producing art, not art per se. It is an artistic medium as is painting or sculpture. Whether or not an image should be considered art, should not be determined by the cultural baggage attached to the chosen medium, but rather the artistic merit of what is produced.

To me my tattoos have always been art. Whether applied in a seedy parlour or a swanky studio, it was always art that was being done. But, I am not an artist and I have never studied art at university. I am not of ‘the art world’ and thus I do not have the power to confer the status of ‘art’. However, should the cultural upgrading of tattoo continue those with that power may soon place tattoos in the realm of art, as I, and many others, do.

Mair Underwood PhD (Anthropology) THE UNIVERSITY OF QUEENSLAND

Notes

1 Caplan, Jane 2000 Written on the body: The tattoo in European and American history, Reaktion: London.

2 Hesselt van Dinter, Maarten 2005 The world of tattoo: An illustrated history. KIT Publishers: Amsterdam.

3 “The West” is a problematic term for many reasons which are beyond the scope of this paper. However, as I can think of no better term for my purposes, I am employing it here to distinguish the tattoo histories of Europe and various former European colonies (including Australia and the United States of America) from the other tattoo histories of Oceania, Asia, Africa and the Americas.

4 Sanders, Clinton R. (with D. Angus Vail) 2008 Customizing the body: The art and culture of tattooing. Temple University Press: Philadelphia.

5 Prior to this tattoo was termed “pricking” in the West.4

6 DeMello, Margo 2000 Bodies of Inscription: A cultural history of the modern tattoo community, Duke University Press: Durham.

7 The Aborigines, like most dark-skinned people, practised tattoo’s sister art, scarification.

8 Kent, David 1997 Decorative bodies: The significance of convicts’ tattoos, Journal of Australian Studies 21(53):78-88.

9 Cohen, Tony 1994 The Tattoo, Outback Print: Mosman.

10 Lombroso, C. 1896. The Savage Origins of Tattooing, Popular Science, April: 793-803.

11 Atkinson, Michael 2003 Tattooed: The sociogenesis of a body art University of Toronto Press: Toronto.

12 Hardy, Don Ed 1995 Tattooing as a medium, in Pierced Hearts and True Love: A century of drawings for tattoos, The Drawing Center: New York.

13 Rubin, Arnold 1988 Marks of civilization: Artistic transformations of the human body, Museum of Cultural History, University of California: Los Angeles.

14 Halnon, K.B., and Cohen, S. 2006 Muscles, motorcycles and tattoos: Gentrification in a new frontier, Journal of Consumer Culture 6(1):33-56.

15 Kosut, Mary 2006 ‘Mad artists & tattooed perverts: Deviant discourse and the social construction of cultural categories’, Deviant Behavior, 27(1):73-95.

16 Heywood, W., Patrick, K., Smith, A., Simpson, J., Pitts, M., Richters, J. and Shelley, J. 2012 Who gets tattoos? Demographic and behavioral correlates of ever being tattooed in a representative sample of men and women, Annals of Epidemiology, 22:51-56.

17 Mifflin, Margot 2012 Inkside out, ARTnews December:92-97.

18 In fact the Tattoo Parlours Act recently instituted in New South Wales (2012) and Queensland (2013) may be seen as an effort to rid tattoo of its cultural baggage. It seems that it is an unapologetic push to rid the practice of tattoo of outlaw motorcycle club members (an integral part of Australian tattoo history). The Act requires tattoo artists to obtain a license which does not prove technical competence (there is no legal requirement in this regard) or adherence to health requirements (other pre-existing licenses cover this), but only that the artist is not associated with certain criminal organisations. It is described by the government as an effort to curb money laundering by outlaw motorcycle clubs. It encourages, whether intentionally or not, the cultural upgrading of tattoo.

19 While some have talked about the gentrification of tattoo as a pushing out of the lower classes and the transformation of the symbolic neighbourhood into a middle-class one (e.g. Halnon and Cohen 2006), I prefer to think of the gentrification of tattoo as involving the cohabitation of the newly entered middle class with the pre-existing lower class. To a large extent it was the gentrification of tattoo that spurred academics to write about Western tattoo history, with publications on tattoo becoming more common from the late 1980s. I believe that accounts of recent tattoo history (e.g. renaissance onwards), including my own, are biased towards the middle class and tend to omit the continued practice of tattoo by the lower classes. The middle classes are new to tattoo which makes them an exciting topic of investigation for academics who themselves tend to be middle-class.

Image: Ah Xian

China/Australia b.1960

Human human - Bust no.5 2002

Hand-beaten copper, finely enamelled in the cloisonné technique 43 cm (ht.)

Acc. 2009.218

Purchased 2009 with funds from Tim Fairfax, AM, through the Queensland Art Gallery Foundation. Collection: Queensland Art Gallery

Image courtesy: Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art