Father Panik
 Clothes, jewelry, art.
A sign of everything
that is wrong and pure.
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FunCity Tattoo, NYC
 94 Saint Marks Pl. New York, NY 212-353-8282
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Stealing Tattoos |
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Written by Orrin Hurley
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Tuesday, 03 August 2010 |
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I'd like to use this blog entry to tackle a huge topic in the tattoo industry these days... PLAGIARISM. The pictures you see here are all tattoos of the same tattoo. The FIRST tattoo pic is MY tattoo.. and the other two were pulled off my website, traced, tattooed, then claimed as their own. Before I get into why this type of behavior holds the industry back and is completely unacceptable, I'd like to tell the story of this particular tattoo. My tattoo (the one on the left with the black background) was done for a friend of mine about 2 years ago. She requested an old school hinge tattoo, but wanted something different. At the time I was looking to do an owl tattoo.. and combined the idea as an attempt to do a clever tattoo idea that I had not seen before. My customer was extremely pleased with the tattoo, and a big part of that was that it seemed to be a very original idea. Fast forward to a few months ago. I get an email from a gentleman in South America. He said He loved the tattoo and wanted one just like it.. but yet he couldn't make it up to me to get it from me. He very politely asked me if it was okay if he had his artist do the exact same tattoo on him. I very politely explained that he was NOT allowed for ANY reason to replicate my tattoo. I explained it wasn't fair to me NOR the person wearing the tattoo on either side (explain even more in depth later). But... I also thanked him for his interest in my work and gave permission to use the tattoo as inspiration for his tattoo. I told him I'd love to see what his artist came up with and to email me pics. Once again.. I said very specifically NOT to trace my tattoo and replicate.. but he was welcome to use it as inspiration. The middle tattoo pic is what he got. Clearly this was traced and reproduced. He also sent me the third pic which was another person in Belgium that ripped the design off.. but with even less technical skill. Other than seriously offending me AND my customer who owns the tattoo, this behavior from both the client AND the artist is completely unacceptable and disrespectful. Lets get into this a little deeper...
When a custom tattoo artist does a custom tattoo he or she is taking years of experience and thousands of hours of hard work, studying, and application of their craft to produce the best possible design they can. It takes years and years of hard work to get to the point a lot of custom tattoo artists are at. Creating a beautiful tattoo isn't easy. For any given tattoo I spend hours and hours thinking about how I can make it clever, complex yet read well, bold and striking, technically as flawless as possible, and overall give the client something that far surpasses their expectations. That requires all the years of my career in art to come to fruition EVERY TIME. I've been tattooing for 12 years now.. and every tattoo no matter if its a sleeve or a quarter-sized rose gets the same amount of attention. Each customer gets a tattoo that no one on Earth has the exact of. Its important for a client that comes to me. NOW.. lets get to the plagiarism. Plagiarism is basically taking the clients tattoo (that is personal and unique) and giving it to someone else just for the sake of making money. How would you feel if your tattoo artist drew you a sleeve unique to you and personal.. then you saw someone with the exact same sleeve yet done half as well. It's insulting. Taking someone else's art and stealing it for the all-mighty dollar is plain wrong. Of course as artists we get customers that come in and say "I want this one exactly!". Its our job as tattoo ARTISTS to take the chance to educate our customer, and take the opportunity to use the idea brought to us and take our skills to do something better. Take the opportunity to create something new, try some new techniques, further our learning as artists, and even get a cool piece for our portfolio in the process. For example both artists that took my tattoo and stole it had a golden opportunity to take the idea of owl heads as hinges.. and draw their own version. I'd be really excited to see the same idea done better! Progress excites me in the art world.. and I would have been flattered if they had used my design for inspiration.. instead of to make a quick dollar. Thats what it comes down to. It comes down to an artist being lazy and putting money ahead of the art form. Its not fair to take someones skin, take another artists years of hard work, and chump out to make money. Being inspired by someone and influenced by their art is totally different! We all have artists we admire and try to incorporate their techniques into our own. But to take their specific tattoos and drawings and replicate them for money is only hurting this industry. So in closing..
Customers- Bring pictures of tattoos and art for your artist to look at for inspiration. Dont take another persons tattoo and ask for it... because any artists that is capable of it should also be talented enough to create you something more amazing!
Tattoo Artists- Inspiration and Plagiarism are completely different. Not trying to be harsh.. but get off your lazy ass and draw your tattoos instead of taking someone elses hard work and stealing it to make a quick buck with minimum effort. Take the opportunity to put the work in to do something amazing! We should all be pushing each other to take things to the next level.. not make a crappy copy of a cassette tape from a crappy copy of a cassette tape. And in closing... if you are copying my tattoos you are just making the same mistakes + your own so the jokes on you.
Thanks for reading!! |
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Last Updated ( Sunday, 23 October 2011 )
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 174 Ludlow St. New York, NY 212.533.8303
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