About the Tattoo Show

These shots were made at the National Tattoo Convention at the Hyatt Regency Hotel, Garden Grove, CA, on April 6, 1991. An interesting scene, this: Imagine, if you will, one of your standard ten-story-high first-class hotel lobby atria--hanging ferns and all that--plunked down in the middle of ultra-conservative Garden Grove, itself in the middle of ultra-conservative Orange County, southern California ... the normal hangout of Republican Businessmen in Brooks Brothers suits and wingtips. But now said RBs are standing on the balconies and glaring at the low-life mob scene on the floor below ... and I do mean "mob scene," the whole joint is jammed. The sight did my faggot/hippie/biker/artist heart good.

I had never been to a tattoo convention and had no idea what to expect. I told my friend Sullivan the tattoo artist that I was thinking about going, and he said he didn't want to--more or less "been-there-done-that"--but he advised that I should, that I'd probably get a kick out of it. So I called ahead to get information, was told that I'd have to present ID and pay something like $20 to get in, etc., etc. As it turned out, none of that BS applied, there were far too many people there for any meaningful kind of crowd control. I hope the organizers didn't lose any money; they had every ballroom in the joint booked (or at least it seemed that way) and all of them were stuffed to bursting with booths, most of them with artists doing tattoos but a lot selling T-shirts, tattoo designs (called "flash" in the trade), and whatever else their proprietors thought they could make some money with. --There were no body-piercers there; the word I got--true or not--was that either the organizers of the event or the hotel management (or both) didn't want them, for whatever reasons. A lot of those in attendance were sore pissed behind that, and any piercer there would certainly have done a good business.

The main thing I discovered about this gig was that, like all of the other special-interest gatherings I've been to such as Mensa gatherings, sci-fi/Trekkie conventions, the Consumer Electronics Show, and even transformation experiences, the event is primarily about geting the peer group together for a Tribal Gathering, and anything and everything else that happens is completely incidental. You can tell from the nature of the booth designs that a lot of their proprietors--and, by extension, probably a lot of the other people there--go to every tattoo show held, making the circuit of them just as Trekkies and [the former, alas] Deadheads and film festivalgoers and electronics/computer freaks &c. &c. do the rounds of their respective Gatherings.

All right, enough of the Sociology bullshit, let's talk about the photos: All shots are untitled unless one is indicated (duh). Click on any thumbnail image for a full-screen view of the picture; close the window to return to this page--you don't have to wait for the page to reload! And, as on the Gallery page, there are also detail scans available, for reference only--these do not represent available prints. I hope you enjoy these, and I hope you like them well enough to buy prints!

Note: All of the large-scale scans are "watermarked" with my copyright and logo to discourage illegal distribution, but prints are not watermarked.

Catalog Number: 73-18 Title: Naw, it don't hurt. Detail (485K)

Catalog Number: 72-30

Catalog Number: 72-12

Catalog Number: 72-4

Catalog Number: 75-17

Catalog Number: 75-19 Title: Yo, dude! Note: Slightly motion-blurred.

Catalog Number: 72-13

Catalog Number: 73-20

Catalog Number: 74-7

Catalog Number: 74-22

Catalog Number: 72-17 Detail (454K)

Catalog Number: 74-19

Catalog Number: 73-29

Catalog Number: 72-16

Catalog Number: 72-15 Detail (485K)

I don't know anything about these kids. We can perhaps speculate from the chubby one's haircut, from the boxers sticking up over the belt, and from the imagery of his tattoo, that he is close to the cholo (Hispanic gang) culture; but beyond that I would not want to hazard a guess. However, for kids this young (I'd guess they were about 16 or so) to be so extensively and so well tattooed (the thinner kid is quite thoroughly covered, which doesn't show in these shots) is quite extraordinary. --The colors in the chubby kid's tat mark one of the few times I wish I was shooting in color.

Catalog Number: 75-14

Catalog Number: 74-3 An example of the "type" Conservative people often think of when the word "tattoo" is mentioned: a guy who seems to have been around the block more than once, including (I'd hazard to guess) some prison time. (That's "White Pride" on his left pectoral.) --I didn't ask him for the pose: he just did it when I pointed the camera at him. Is this an example of what anthropologists call "presentation behavior"?

Detail (269K)

Catalog Numbers: 71-8 (left) and 72-7 (right) Again, someone at the Convention I know nothing about but wish I did--strictly from an anthropological / sociological point of view, of course. Again, here's someone rather young, who has gone the full route of tattooing and piercing. What's behind this, what started him off down that road? And why couldn't I have gone down the same path much earlier?! --I didn't ask him to take off his clothes; he was standing around in a relatively isolated part of the hotel, talking with some other people, when *bang* off they came. Carpe diem, hey?

Catalog Number: 71-18 This guy has removed his clothes in order to keep them from being splattered with ink from the tattoo machine.

Catalog Number: 72-24 Title: 13 Rings 13 Detail (67K)

Catalog Number: 73-13

Catalog Number:73-17

Catalog Number: 74-13 Note: This image was inadvertently omitted from the Gallery page in the last pass through the code; it has now been restored.

Catalog Number: 73-25 Detail (127K)

Catalog Number: 74-26

Catalog Number: 73-6 I guess the point of this shot is that all sorts of people get tattoos, and attend tattoo conventions. I guess. Detail (151K)

Catalog Number: 72-5

Catalog Number: 73-2 Title: Mt. Rushhead Detail (136K) I don't know who the people are that are portrayed in this tattoo; perhaps someone who sees this can enlighten me. --No, the title has nothing whatever to do with Rush Limbaugh.

Catalog Number: 74-23 This guy, one of the artists doing tattoos, wasn't all that enthusiastic about my taking his picture, and I think it shows; whether it was reticence or just plain annoyance at yet another tourist photographing him (or something else), I don't know.

Catalog Number: 74-5 I guess this guy--who is looking over "flash," tattoo designs--is a tattoo artist, but I'm not sure; the designs are of the more modern "tribal" variety.

Catalog Number: 73-22 And, last but certainly not least, a photo of one Ed Hardy--I think he was one of the organizers of this convention, and he's certainly a great proponent of tattoing: as an artist, as a writer, and in many other ways. Here's to ya, Ed!