One more convention down. That marks 15 years of legal tattooing in New York. I don't know why these days the years seem to speed by faster and faster. I got a little quote in the Daily News . The reporter said he wanted a "little color" for the story and asked me to share a convention story. One of my most memorable  convention weekends was the year I met Tattoo Theo. Theo's picture from 1960 is in the 1,000 Tattoos book by Hanky Panky. This was about 10 years ago that I met him. Theo was German and spoke no English what so ever. He was born in 1932,  was completely tattooed and liked getting souvenir tattoos in the tiny spots he had left. He had piercings over his chest in the shape of an anchor. When crowds started snapping pictures he was happy to drop his drawers just so everyone could see how tattooed up he was and also catch all those other piercings he had going on. For me the best part of a tattoo convention is having a place where the tattoo community comes together and we get to connect with parts of our community we may never otherwise come across. It's great to see all of our friends and I love how many friends I have made just by working conventions. I saw  Theo again the following year and he even stopped by Daredevil to say hello. I re-worked a tattoo he had on his hand that time. Theo was up to his third or fourth layer.

"What are you going to do when you get old?" is probably only second to "does it hurt?" in terms of tired tattoo questions. It sure was cool to see someone like Theo at 70 years old having a blast traveling to a country he doesn't speak the language of making friends and getting his picture taken.  I'm glad we have a community of folks that appreciates it's past and welcomes the old guys to their midst. Hopefully we'll all be having as much fun thanks to our tattoos when they're old and saggy  and hopefully people will always appreciate the stories those tattoos tell. Theo died in 2004. I'm glad I had the chance to meet him. I got the chance because of the New York City Tattoo Convention . 

Hope you caught the show and I hope you got to make some new friends or caught up with some old friends. Here's some shots from www.needlesandsins .com Flickr set

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sarel said:

can a devil be seen with naked eyes

April 11, 2013

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