Sierra's Mayflower in June

Last month, I found myself at the corner of 86th Street and 5th Avenue in Manhattan, waiting for the crosstown bus.

I looked over to my right and saw a tattoo with incredible line work:

This tattoo belongs to Sierra, who was kind enough to send me a photo of the tattoo later that evening. She also told me a little more about the piece:

"My tattoo is of the Mayflower. My parents took me to Plymouth a lot as a child and it fostered a great love of American History. I wanted something to commemorate that. I chose this scale drawing because I wanted something 'antique-ish' and not to 'pirate-y'."

Sierra credits the talented Mark Harada at East Side Ink with this amazingly well-lined work. "I love [his] work," she wrote me, "and do plan to have him do another for me in the future."

Thanks to Sierra for sharing her Mayflower with us here on Tattoosday!

This entry is ©2012 Tattoosday.

If you are reading this on another web site 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.

Anna's Ship, With a Nod to a Favorite Song

Yesterday I posted Bjorn's Michael Jackson Thriller tattoo. When I met him, walking on the Coney Island Boardwalk, he was accompanied by Anna, who also had quite a few tattoos. She offered up this one on her left thigh:

The banner around this classic ship tattoo reads "Yo no soy marinero soy el capitán."

This is a refrain from the Richie Valens song "La Bamba," and is translated as "I am not a sailor, I am a captain." This was Anna's favorite song when she was a kid.

She credited this cool tattoo to Nick Caruso, when he was at Flyrite Tattoo in Brooklyn. Nick has since left Flyrite and opened up Bound for Glory Tattoo in Staten Island.

Thanks to Anna for sharing this awesome tattoo with us here on Tattoosday!


This entry is ©2012 Tattoosday.

If you are reading this on another web site 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.

Holy Ship! Isaac's Vessel and a Biblical Quote

There are a few tattoo artists whose work is so good that, when I'm lucky enough to stumble upon one of their clients, I consider it a great day.

Such was the case on a Monday in August on the Upper West Side, when I stopped Isaac in Trader Joe's as he walked past me. I knew, even before he told me who the artist was, that this piece was special:

Isaac explained that this ship was inked by the amazing Amanda Wachob of Dare Devil Tattoo in Manhattan. Amanda was featured in a small post in the New York Times earlier this year here. I have been fortunate enough to stumble across her work personally once before, as documented in this post from last October.

Isaac explained that this ship was inspired by The Flying Dutchman, a painting by Albert Pinkham Ryder.

One of the amazing things about Amanda Wachob's work is how her tattoos look like they are painted onto the skin. Check out the front of Isaac's ship:

"I used to write 'I'm a Son' on my arm all the time," Isaac told me, "as in a son of God," so he refers to this as his sonship.

He also shared this piece on his left biceps:

This is a Biblical reference, from 1 Corinthians 13, Verses 4-8. The passage is

"Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away."

Isaac and his wife have the same piece, with hers being on her right arm. I love the font that the artist used. He attributed it to Kelly at East Side Ink. Kelly is absent from the shop website, so must have been a former or visiting artist.

Thanks so much to Isaac for sharing these wonderful tattoos with us here on Tattoosday!

This entry is ©2011 Tattoosday.

If you are reading this on another web site 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.