Old School

What makes a tattoo “Traditional”? Some folks mistake a traditional tattoo for one that is poorly drawn, and certainly the old days had their fair share of mediocre artists. On the other hand there were plenty of amazing tattooers, and the real reason for the simple style of drawing was twofold. First, in the ‘old days’ of traditional tattooing (1920′s to 1960′s) the primary clientele was soldiers and sailors, these groups would come in on leave from training or on shore leave from their ships. . .and they all came in at once! In order to pump out 100 tattoos in one day what was required was an art style that could be applied quickly, with strong graphic qualities, and that would be able to survive the less than ideal healing process most military folk put their new ink through.

Second, the technology of tattooing was different than we have today. there were no purpose built tattoo needles, the artists of the day had to use whatever sort of pins they could acquire from wholesale needle makers, these pins were suited for sewing but less than ideal for tattooing. To overcome the limitations a large group of needles were used for the outline, this resulted in a bold line that made up for the individual pins weaknesses AND meant that a line that would last could be applied in one pass. The drawback to such a bold outline is that small details wont work, faces had to be simplified on pin up girls and lettering had to be simple and straightforward to stand the test of time. The combination of the strong graphic quality and the need for designs that could be applied quickly resulted in what we came to call “traditional” tattooing.

I did this rose today on the back of Cara’s thigh, although I drew it from scratch I tried to remain faithful to the traditional aesthetic.

Another trait that an authentic ‘traditional’ tattoo has is a very limited color palette. In the same way that needles were not made for tattooers neither were pigments, in fact most pigments contained ingredients back then that could be hazardous in a tattoo. Tattooers would often order powdered pigment from a paint supplier and do a test patch in their own leg, if it didn’t flare up, cause a reaction or burn then it was considered safe to use as tattoo ink. In the old days the only colors that could be reliable applied without a customer getting ill were black, green, red, and yellow (and red was still pretty iffy. . . ) To this day a traditional tattoo looks the most genuine when only those colors are used, as soon as a little blue or purple gets put in there it ceases to have that old-school sailor look.

Whether done on purpose or a happy accident, it turned out that traditional tattoos had a great ability to remain readable and hold up for decades. Lots of old military folk have a pin up girl or eagle on their arm over 50 years old and most of them are still clear enough to read the faces and feather details. Lets hope Caras rose looks that good when she is 70!

The Crisis that wasnt really there.

This began as a response to a blog.

I’ve been reading more and more about how ‘real’ Buddhists are worried (read: offended) that western Buddhists aren’t ‘doing it right’. Then a bunch of examples are trotted out about how ‘they’ aren’t being authentic. Mainly it seems like people are  annoyed that Buddhism is turning into a self-help trend or is becoming about ego gratification. These are valid concerns, i suppose, but what has always struck me as authentic in Buddhism and zen in particular is that the Buddha was very clear on one thing. Mind your OWN path. If your own back yard isnt clean (and whose is) then what business do you have trying to tell your neighbor to clean up his yard?

If I have one criticism of western Buddhism its that we seem to have  a hard-on for pointing out how “WE” are doing it right (whatever IT is at the moment) and “THEY” are doing it wrong and need to be stopped!  It seems like we believe that if we can point to anothers failings (in our opinions) then somehow that makes our way feel that much more correct. Its silly and it causes suffering. The Dead Kennedys lead singer once said “If you don’t like our music you don’t have to ban us, just change the channel!” and the same goes for western Buddhism, if you don’t like how its being done then dont do it that way! You don’t need to bitch about it, it doesn’t require your defense, I can guarantee that you aren’t going to change it by any means other than simply making your own Buddhism is as true as you know how.

Its a difficult path we walk. Trying to balance between honoring all the work those before us have done while still working on an authentic practice for ourselves. Joseph Campbell used to bemoan the state of religion when it stopped being about the lives of the people who practiced it and instead became the mere repetition of stories that no longer meant anything to the people who practiced it. “If your myth needs to be explained to you” he said “then it isn’t working for you”.

For a lot of us we confuse the exotic elements of Asian/Indian culture with being ‘really” Buddhist. I think in doing so we don’t honor the tradition of Buddhism, we fetish-ise it! Steven Hagen wrote an amazing book on Zen buddhism called “Buddhism: Its not what you think” that is as authentic a book on Zen as Ive ever read and yet it contains none of the ‘exotic orient” type fluff that so many zen books do. After I read it I had no doubt as to how serious and faithful it was to true Zen awakening, but the only traditions it upheld are the ones core ones the Buddha taught via his own example.  It taught me that there is a real core to Buddhism that is apart from whatever cultural traditions have been attached to it over the years. No incense, no statues, no magic chants, no pithy saying written in a language I cant read is going to be more true than rigorous honesty and daily practice.

Now a read a lot in magazines and blogs about how western Buddhism is ‘doing it wrong’. I have a suspicion that all this hand wringing and worry about ‘authentic’ Buddhist tradition is wasted effort. Buddhism will do what it has always done, it will be an authentic path to freedom from samsara for a some, a comfort to many , and an excuse for lousy behavior by a few. It (and all faiths really) have always been this way regardless of how upset we get about it. It will adapt to whatever local custom(in our case I suspect that the idea of ‘self-help” is our authentic tradition in the west). Perhaps what is so offensive to so many ‘real’ Buddhists is that western Buddhism doesnt seem exotic and strange enough. Maybe the reason so many Westerners dig on Tibetan and Japanese Buddhism is that it seems to foreign. Its like we cant accept that something presented to us in a form we recognise could have that magical ‘deeper’ truth we are seeking, Im beginning to suspect that thats the ONLY authentic place we are going to find it. Tibetans don’t go looking for French or American style Buddhist practice, they follow their own tradition and maybe its better that we do that for our tradition (however young it is) too.

We do have a part to play though in making Buddhism into what we would like it to be in the west and it isn’t by bitching and finger wagging, if we simply do what we believe is the right thing and try to make our personal Buddhism as honest as it can be. We protect what we feel is honest about Buddhism with our example. Finally, Im not at all sure why these folks are so upset. Even if you could tell ‘real’ buddhsim from the ‘wrong’ kind, how would that matter!? If some yahoo wants to go around telling everyone that buddhism is standing on one foot with an egg on your head, and even if millions believe him, it still wont change anything in your own practice! And guess what, the only practice you should be worrying about, keeping ‘pure’, and protecting is your own.

Lets hope this works out! heh heh

We decided to celebrate Friday the 13th at our shop with some fun work. Im not sure if anyone will show up (or if too many people will show up heh heh,) either way we put the word out on myspace and a few other outlets. Lets hope its a success and we get to show off the new shop at its best!

the thin line

The world is full of folks who are angered, frustrated, and insulted by what others are doing. War is the extreme example of this, but how many of us go through an entire day without being offended about what someone else does? I dont know if Ive ever been able to do it. Finally, through far too many years of being pissed of I have learned that one can worry about what everyone else is doing or you can worry about what you are doing. One makes a difference and other just makes you mad.

I cant tell anyone how to live their life, and i certainly wont try. All I can say is that based on my own experience that my life and my work suffered when I was concerned about what other tattooers were doing, when I let it go my work improved. Apparently I was diverting some of that energy that could be going to improving my tattoo work into anger and frustration with what “they” were “doing” to my beloved tattooing.

I now believe that you can do more to improve the world by managing the small part of it you occupy than yelling and pointing fingers about everyone elses little space.

There’s such a fine line between being compassionate and empathetic and being nosey and superior. Lots of folks honestly believe that by being angry at someone that they are showing ‘concern’, I certainly have done it. The fact is that when you stop for a second and look at the real motivation behind all this “concern” you realise (or at least I did) that what was really there was a sense of moral superiority. What you are saying is “I’m obviously right in my behaviour, why are ‘those’ people not able to see how right I am and be like ME!?” This is never the same as compassion no matter how nicely you put it. You might call it pity, but pity is not compassion, its feeling superior because whoever the object of your pity is obviously “doesn’t have what you have”.

Sometimes Buddhists are accused of being emotionally numb or snobbily removed from the world. We don’t rant and scream as the bad things in the world and we don’t confront violence against us with more violence. Most ‘normal’  folks appear to think of us as a combination of Mr.Spock and a hippy vegan! What is misunderstood in this view is that we haven’t lost any emotion at all and are certainly concerned with the rest of the world, however we are making an effort to ‘fix’ the world by working on the only thing any of us really have the power to change, ourselves! With enough sitting and self-questioning we realise how much all those outwardly dramatic displays were not explosions of real emotion, but were simply things to gratify our egos. No one ever saved the planet by being angry about the state its in, its the folks who diligently avoid harming the planet in their own quiet way who are doing more than anyone yelling and waving a sign is to ‘fix’ things.

Today we are asked to remember Dr. Martin Luther King, a man who changed the world through the simple act of not riding segregated buses, of eating a sandwich at ‘whites only’ lunch counters, of encouraging a disenfranchised people to register to vote in places they had never been allowed to before. His rhetoric never called for blood, his tactics never involved violence and his genius was in knowing that if the black citizens of the south simply acted with dignity and humanity that the injustice they dealt with would end simply by the force of each individual doing the right thing day after day. So it is with Buddhism, we change the world one moment at a time, by being honest with ourselves, with compassion for the entire universe, and with a dedication to be the change we wish to see. We do not cross the thin line from controlling our selves to trying to control others, and the result is that, in the end, we make the world better for all.

Helpful list #6104

After having been a (more or less) professional artist for  a dozen years now, Ive managed to learn a few things. Things I would have saved quite a bit of time and effort had I known them before. Hopefully, one or two of these could help someone before they take as long as I did to figure it out. . . .

1. It seems to me that the secret to any kind of art is repetition, repetition, repetition! For the longest time I thought (like many folks) that artistic talent was somehow like being born with green eyes or a roman nose, inherent, genetic, somehow a blessing that some folks had and some didn’t. Im sure there must be some amount of inborn talent, but Ive also found that all the talent in the world is useless without practice. When I began to seriously try to do Japanese style tattoos I found that the images in my head simply wouldn’t come out of my hand, this was frustrating because there was always a sense that I knew I could do the art but that disconnect fouled it up every time. I began working on drawing these elements in my spare time, waves, dragons, koi, flowers, I would draw every chance I had! It seems like common sense, but it eventually dawned on my dumb mind that the 100th wave I drew was a substantial improvement over the first.

Of course you never really arrive at a point where you can stop practicing and improving, but these days when i need a Japanese wave my hand knows how to do it without much conscious thought. Its like art kung fu, you need to train your talent into an automatic response. In martial arts you repeat a move to the point where you react without thinking , in art you need to train your hand to do the same. Repetition is the way to do that.

2. Its a sad fact that lots of folks in our business use artistic freedom to do shoddy work. Ive seen (and years ago, did) plenty of tattoos of anime limp penis-looking koi, half-assed jesus portraits, undetailed guns, anatomically laughable skulls, sloppy play-doh looking roses, and tons of other objects as tattoos that a little reference would have saved. Reference will make the difference between something that looks sort of right and something that is dead on. The excuse that by just drawing something out of your head is somehow artistically more pure or OK is simply an excuse to be lazy. When I began using reference the quality and look of my work increased dramatically. It still had all my own ‘touches” that make  a piece mine, but the whole had an strong foundation and shape and detail that i would have never been able to pull out of my brain alone. We have this notion in our trade that everything we do must somehow spring forth out of our heads as a totally original unique and fully formed image, the reality is that nothing ever happens that way, the world is our reference, only a dilettante or lazy person wouldn’t use it!

Start collecting books now! The internet is a great resource, but I like to print stuff out and create morgue-books of each subject. Often when drawing Ill have 4 or 5 references in front of me, my piece comes out as my vision dictates, but its given much more strength by the references that influenced it. The more reference you have the better your art will come out.

3. How do you really find out what kind of work you do? Ask your friends? Ask your customer? Unfortunately those people want to believe your work is stellar, and they wont have the technical knowledge to make an informed suggestion. The solution? Peer review (a.k.a critiques) is very important to any kind of artistic growth. Critiques are easy to get these days on internet forums and at conventions most artists not in the middle of work will gladly hand out critiques.

The secret to getting a critique is to keep your mouth shut. Period. Listen to what is suggested, even if you later decide to disregard the critique, when its going on just be a sponge, put the ego away and keep in mind that the critique is someone taking their time to try to help you. Yes it hurts to hear what is wrong with your work, but if you listen you will improve quickly.

The long and short of it is that art is, like most things in life, hard work. Dedication and determination will carry you further than a ton of natural talent hampered by laziness.

Some New old School

Some traditional-ish work Ive been putting out lately.

I did this shark on another tattooers hand this week. There is always a little extra pressure when you are tattooing a tattooer, you know that every line will be scrutinized and evaluated. . . for the rest of that persons life.

Anyhow, this was fun to do and for once I managed to keep it simple and not blob it up with all kinds of needless detail.

Next I did this sweet scary horse (night-mare?) on a great regular customer. This is a little more straight up traditional, we limited the colors to the “traditional” palette. Black, red, green, and yellow and thats it. For me the problem has always been leaving enough skin tone, I used to color everything to the gills, it looked ok but it lost that old-school peppery color look. This time I kept it clean though.

This one came out pretty good, i think.

I love this kind of stuff. Still, on the horizon is some large Japanese work, Ive been super inspired lately. Im also working on some t-shirt designs for the shop and if they come out the way i think they will I’ll be stoked!

Cara has been coming in daily and did her first paying tattoo this week! In true tattoo trial-by-fire she got to do a name on some floppy boobs. hey, its not all rock stars and rappers (in fact, its never rock stars or rappers hee hee). She was a pro and has been working on her own legs (a very traditional way to practice) and kicking ass.  Im so proud of her, our shop, the customers Ive been blessed with and if it wasn’t minus 4 degrees here I might think I was in heaven!

No quarter asked, none given

One of the funniest things Ive ever heard about Buddhism is that it is a “passive” philosophy. That its about not doing ‘anything’ and sitting around zoning out. That it is a religion with no morality. This is funny because once you see through the outer trappings it quickly becomes apparent that being a Buddhist is non-stop, intensely moral activity!

I suppose seeing a bunch of folks meditating might seem to be just so much sitting around, but ask anyone whose tried zazen and they will tell you that the simple task of sitting for 20 or so minutes can be one of the most challenging things they have ever done. What is actually ‘passive’ is allowing your monkey mind to roam all over chucking its own poop around inside your consciousness and doing nothing about it as one suffering hits you after another. Its easy to suffer, its hard work to end it.

Observing and controlling yourself is non-stop and becoming aware of real morality is a one way trip, once your eyes have opened to the right way to treat yourself, others, and the world you can never go back to being ignorant again. Take morality for example;

we all know that stealing is wrong, but why is it wrong? Well before I sat on these concepts for years I might have told you it was because if you steal then you get in trouble or that it hurts that other person financially or emotionally, and thats fine as far as it goes. . .but it doesnt go far enough. This sort of morality leaves the door open for all kinds of rationalization. If we believe that stealing is wrong because of consequences then our oh-so-slippery minds can come up with reasons why it would be ok to steal. . . like what if you are stealing from someone who will never know it? (Like taking toilet paper from your giant corporate office.) Or What if you steal from someone who ‘deserves it? ( Like downloading music from those ‘greedy’ record labels). All of the sudden we have made it ok to steal in our minds. But Buddhism doesn’t allow you any refuge from what you know is the truth, and the truth is that stealing is stealing, even from work and even from ‘greedy’ people.We dont do it because its wrong, period.

These days if you ask me why stealing is wrong i would answer this way; stealing is greed and this causes suffering, stealing is imposing my needs over another and this is suffering, stealing causes friction among all and this is suffering, stealing is laziness and this is suffering, and stealing is harm to myself and others. Stealing is wrong because it brings suffering into the world.

Becoming a Buddhist and undertaking to end suffering means that this kind of thinking is applied to everything you do. It means you can not hide from your responsibility or conceal you own failings. It means eternal vigilance.

this doesn’t sound very passive to me.

If you havent already. . .

. . . Check out the Black Cat tattoos page. For reals we got everything squared away and looking pretty.

www.blackcattattoos.net

The shop is shaping up, ive already thrown about 40 tons of crap into the black hole i call the shop basement and we are slowly, but surely, beginning to remodel and spruce the place up. Ive already gotten one big wish and that is to have natural light, after a decade under flourescents I cant tell you what a mental difference that makes! Plus my mutant bamboo plant is exploding with new shoots, I think its the vegetable equivelent of a boner.

Coming soon, Pictures of the shop in all its ghetto fabulousness!

No more norovirus for me, thanks.

So on the night of the 1st I enjoyed some sauerkraut and pork in typical new years tradition. its an old Eastern European meal said to bring good luck and fortune. Sadly, it was also the last thing i ate before a little uninvited guest known as the norovirus that i had contracted on the previous night from a fellow new years party goer decided it had replicated enough to begin its attack on my intestinal tract. At 3am I began poosquirting and by 4 am i was puking violently. The next bunch of hours were a repeat of this coupled with horrible cramping and nausea.

That day was supposed to be the first day of my new tattoo shop and the first customers were my nieces who I hadnt seen in 2 years. I was too sick to go in and I felt awful about having to cancel. It turns out that it was a good thing that I did.

Later that morning there was some going to the bank that I absolutely had to do and could not put off at all without bouncing some important checks. So I begged my parents to come drive me to the bank which they graciously did, however between standing in line, not having eaten or drank anything for 20 hours and having shit/yakked all my bodily fluids out I nearly passed out in line at the bank! I was literally hanging onto the counter for dear life with black spots on the edge of my vision and my knees quivering under me! I went home and puked and slept some more. Cara brought me applesauce and jello and immodium (the miracle drug lol) and most importantly, pity and hugs!

The thing about these stomach viruses is that the leave quickly, this one was pretty much all better by 3 am but i remained horribly dehydrated for the next 12 hours. The next day I went to work too late to really eat first and realised I had a ton of shit to clean up before my first customer. . . oh and I hadn’t drawn this persons tattoo up yet either. I freaked the fuck out.

but I got through it and now day three stuff is going good! I finished this bad boy today. . .