The process of this tattoo has often included with it a consistent subversion of my expectations. Sometimes, even the most familiar experiences can surprise you. For my 143rd appointment with Horizakura, we did not continue to shade my bodysuit. I expected that based on my previous appointment, perhaps the last claw and the damned whisker would be the next things to be shaded. Instead, I arrived at the shop yesterday to see a little cup of white ink on Horizakura’s tray. MUCH EXCITE.

I have continued my relatively hands-off approach to this tattoo with the choices and application of the color. I am content to receive what Horizakura thinks is best. As such, I knew his plan was to add white and gold to the dragon, but I wasn’t sure exactly what the distribution of those colors would be. As he was tattooing me, I was trying to discern what parts he was working on, but I was having trouble figuring out if was the edges of the feathers or the spines of the feathers. Shortly after the appointment, I found it difficult to even tell what had been done through the plastic wrap that was covering the tattoo. While I was extremely excited about this milestone, I was also feeling a bit discouraged as the two hours did not seem to yield very much progress. At first, I thought he was only able to shade the feathers of the right wing during our appointment. I also, however, remembered him working over my spine and there are no feathers there. That was when I realized the true scope of his progress and relief washed over me. As you can see in the photos, he added white to the right wing, the spine of the dragon, and the small tufted feathers under the dragons left wing. The latter in particular is a great place to see the difference between the white ink and my skin tone. Much like black ink, I find that white ink pops the most when additional colors are filled in around it. Color applied by tebori also takes some time to reach it’s true vibrancy. You will also notice in the pictures there is a sort of red tint in the white since it’s a fresh tattoo. With that context, I’m very excited to see how this will develop over time and I’m already looking forward to our next appointment.

I wrote this post shortly after attending the convention, but did not publish it. There are some time/date references that might not make sense without this context.

This past weekend, I had the distinct pleasure of attending (and getting tattooed at) the 1st Annual New York City Tattoo Arts Convention. Under any other circumstance, I might have pushed this blog post to a later date, but this is one of those situations where I need to leverage this blog as a way to chronicle an experience that I might lose to bad memory over time. Even now that I’ve had a day or so to ruminate on the whole thing, I’m not sure where to begin.

Several months ago, when I first became aware of the convention, a little idea sparked inside me that I decided to pursue. I thought it might be neat to try to arrange for a social gathering of Japanese tattoo wearers and/or enthusiasts. I imagined an empty meeting room in the convention hall or at a hotel, or perhaps a public park if that’s all I could find. Hoping against hope, I messaged the organizers of the convention and asked them if there was any space in the venue where such an meeting might occur. I have been in some extraordinarily cramped tattoo conventions in my life, I could only image the absolute chaos and disruption a gathering of 10 – 15 people might impose upon an unsuspecting convention floor. After a brief back-and-forth, I was told that the rooftop of the venue would be available to us at 3pm on the Saturday of the convention. I was overjoyed. I immediately began to spread the word with what limited reach I had, leaning on the fact that the support of Meri and Civ (the Mighty Duo that ran the ship) would hopefully be enough to get some people together. I purchased a three day pass and shot out as much social media advertisement for the event as I felt was appropriate. During the weeks that followed, Elivia Iannaccone signed on to photograph the meetup and Ruri from Wuhao NYC offered to provide fundoshi and tenugui for any that were interested. I couldn’t believe how it was all coming together.

When the weekend finally came, I was able to attend on Friday as a way to say hello to some tattooers, see some friends, and get a lay of the land. A completely unforeseen bonus to the whole ordeal was walking the show floor with my friend Eileen as it was her first tattoo convention ever. I would have made one helluva sherpa. We took our time walking the show floors, talking to folks here and there and shaking the hands of some of the greatest to ever hold a machine. Just the details of that first night would have been enough for a truly bloated blog post, I could not have imagined what was to come.

On Saturday afternoon, I met Ruri on the roof of the building with an (unknowingly second hand) pop-up changing booth from Walmart. I opened it up to find that it was chock full of sand but was sold to me as if it was new. I cleaned it up as best I could and we pressed on. As 3 o’clock arrived, more and more people began to join us on the roof. I put on my fundoshi to lead the charge and eventually a gathering of about 15 bodysuits in various states of completion (a good number of them finished) were joined by lots more sleeves and backpieces and tattoo lovers. Just the fact that I was not up there alone made it a success in my eyes. Not long after, Civ expressed his desire that we all go down to the main stage for a photo there. The vast majority of the group agreed and we all went down into the venue with naught but some bits of cloth covering our tender bits. First they photographed our backpieces and then we turned and what I saw was three floors of eye balls staring and countless phones out for photos. It was at that point that I realized perhaps my previous bar for success was not properly calibrated. Once that was over, the meet up largely fizzled as well. I returned to the roof to clean up the booth, get dressed (though I didn’t put my shirt back on until the day was over) and hangout with friends until my tattoo appointment at 7pm. Just like the previous day, I spent most of my time exchanging words with some of tattoo’s finest. It was a true pleasure. I swung by Shinji’s booth about an hour before my appointment just to say hey and check in. Shindou was setting up for a one point tattoo and I knew in that moment that I was getting bumped. A few minute later I saw Shinji in the hallway and he told me he was going to cancel our one hour appointment so Shindou could do this tattoo. The booth was not large enough for both of them to work at the same time and it’s really important that Shindou have as many opportunities as possible to build their client base, so of course I was fine with it (no hard feelings if you’re reading this Alfonso!). I knew my usual Sunday appointment was locked in and that would be good enough for me, especially after the weekend I was having.

On Sunday, my wife and son came into the city with me to watch me get tattooed and visit the convention. There is absolutely nothing easy about having a toddler at a tattoo convention, but it was really fun to have them both their. I can’t say enough about Shindou’s and Horizakura’s patience as we battled tight quarters so my family could visit with me a bit. Also, shout out to RG for letting us store a stroller under his table. As for the appointment itself, Horizakura continued to shade different black details on my backpiece for two hours. To my left, RG, Damien Rodriguez, and Horimomo. To my right, Kiku and Mutsuo. In 2016, I was blessed by Pope Francis in the Papal Audience Chamber in Vatican City. This tattoo appointment felt a lot like that except better in every conceivable way.

I have left out a lot of details in this weekend account (which included two sandwiches) because it’s simply too much to type and I lack the skills to make it all into one coherent post. I know I started out by explaining how important this blog is for supporting my terrible memory… but as I reflect on it all, I’m not sure I could ever forget this weekend and the friends I spent time with and the new people I met. I know that nothing in life is immune from having the sort of mean, ugly side that can turn even the most ardent supporters bitter or jaded. I am sure a great many tattooers have witnessed that meanness or felt the threat of that apathy first hand. Even still, it is hard for me to not look back on this weekend and view tattooing as anything other than an incredible gift.

One was a pastrami reuben with mustard and the other was an Italian sub with too much mayo.

Photos of the Meetup by Elvia:

These are photos from after appointment 142 at the convention. Two hours of tebori on various details. The last of the feathers on the left wing, the left horn on the dragon, in the teeth, and the claw on my left side.