William's Museum of Art

I met William on the <a href="http://www.mta.info/nyct/service/aline.htm">A train</a> one Sunday morning. He was <i>covered </i>with tattoos. When I asked him how many he has, he replied that he had "never counted".<br /><br />As many of my subjects can attest, when I meet people with a lot of ink, I ask them which one they'd like me to post on the site. William offered up a tattoo he has of <a href="http://www.marilynmonroe.com/">Marilyn Monroe</a>, as seen by <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andy_Warhol">Andy Warhol</a>. But, as such a tattoo has appeared here before (see Nina's ink <a href="http://tattoosday.blogspot.com/2008/09/introducing-ninas-ink-part-1.html">here</a>), I asked for something else. He let me choose this piece, a tattoo of the work of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Michel_Basquiat">Jean-Michel Basquiat</a>: <br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZ_Ps1ambQ-fm2KSazufYI3sJIahIVS-03-oFhtvZ9gk0obLIr3UegjCexHck_BDSh_AfiDXkGGAPslZ5SfFLf5IJ26lwy7u5hvmwrOGtGHqnrfudRFZ_eNge-AZNWaLaORVmAH_KZ/s1600/Basquiat+general+wm.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZ_Ps1ambQ-fm2KSazufYI3sJIahIVS-03-oFhtvZ9gk0obLIr3UegjCexHck_BDSh_AfiDXkGGAPslZ5SfFLf5IJ26lwy7u5hvmwrOGtGHqnrfudRFZ_eNge-AZNWaLaORVmAH_KZ/s640/Basquiat+general+wm.jpg" width="330" /></a></div><br />A closer look:<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5FzxrEPHWEAaQo3SnCNTtdQXqyXqZf6O6yIYyYgpFhNrMZX-qdI8HiiawR5hsu7yZBREy2HqGV4Zr13TW8Qn62NChl8gtNBnxwOW7aBe2mBMWg3GWc4ixII2loVKRt4s1dS2ZfPH4/s1600/basquiat+detail+wm.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5FzxrEPHWEAaQo3SnCNTtdQXqyXqZf6O6yIYyYgpFhNrMZX-qdI8HiiawR5hsu7yZBREy2HqGV4Zr13TW8Qn62NChl8gtNBnxwOW7aBe2mBMWg3GWc4ixII2loVKRt4s1dS2ZfPH4/s640/basquiat+detail+wm.jpg" width="308" /></a></div><br />This is based on Basquiat's artwork, which is most recognizable from its appearance on the cover of a Maya Angelou children's story.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0QucZpYbKzoq6L1kgPjs6cWpmUaHr0FPVcnHXqBO-gcxytv1blsJYYpqIsKg9XQ0Jt3r7YlQfHjCdCIg3Umf_6HQjPyjNj8Mg_0X1_tEUzYZ3B3t5AdIHkkYFYZ2eats2VKlHoEzM/s1600/bas.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0QucZpYbKzoq6L1kgPjs6cWpmUaHr0FPVcnHXqBO-gcxytv1blsJYYpqIsKg9XQ0Jt3r7YlQfHjCdCIg3Umf_6HQjPyjNj8Mg_0X1_tEUzYZ3B3t5AdIHkkYFYZ2eats2VKlHoEzM/s320/bas.jpg" width="247" /></a></div><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />William also let me take a picture of his name on his hand, which appeared in Ina Saltz's <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Body-Type-More-Typographic-Tattoos/dp/0810982765?ie=UTF8&tag=bill03-20&link_code=btl&camp=213689&creative=392969" target="_blank">Body Type 2</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=bill03-20&l=btl&camp=213689&creative=392969&o=1&a=0810982765" style="border: medium none ! important; margin: 0px ! important; padding: 0px ! important;" width="1" />:<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvVTIWsNQ9yU7pq07jROd-Z_qyjHjqGOCEJhJ2qy9QZuwICRFXb43zs94JrL47-NL0HH36EioXOqFSye6Q9_lyBjYcFAOXnwTZk9Wv5KgITZFjdn9hJx3AWe1T-MT3HgfPIgG6Y0fj/s1600/will.i.am+wm.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvVTIWsNQ9yU7pq07jROd-Z_qyjHjqGOCEJhJ2qy9QZuwICRFXb43zs94JrL47-NL0HH36EioXOqFSye6Q9_lyBjYcFAOXnwTZk9Wv5KgITZFjdn9hJx3AWe1T-MT3HgfPIgG6Y0fj/s400/will.i.am+wm.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br />William credited the Basquiat tattoo with <a href="http://www.senaspace.com/">David Sena</a> at <a href="http://www.northstartattoo.com/">North Star Tattoo</a> in Manhattan. Work by David Sena appeared previously on Tattoosday <a href="http://tattoosday.blogspot.com/2010/07/two-for-tattoosday-purple-lotus-and.html">here</a>.<br /><br />Thanks to William for sharing his tattoos with us here on Tattoosday!

William's Museum of Art

I met William on the A train one Sunday morning. He was covered with tattoos. When I asked him how many he has, he replied that he had ...

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Tattoosday Goes To Hawai'i - All in the Family, Part 5 (Ulu's Amazing Plumage)

In January 2008, when Tattoosday was a mere infant blog, my mother sent me photos of some of the ink my cousins possessed.<br /><br />I already shared Keali'i's sleeves here, but included in that email from Mom was this astonishing piece from his kid sister, my niece, Ulu:<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiugKlhsvKRjpa003gCF2B8l7kOZyJClC6981ve1eAbYwDM6czjzBlFD85_Tdy9IbAMfJENaAE_A6RSPuVFGiEJFvTPJb4CmTh-6p2LOLG84uTL0XWg8I_bkKizT_pdW4LORsLOg2EF/s1600/Ulu+Feather.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiugKlhsvKRjpa003gCF2B8l7kOZyJClC6981ve1eAbYwDM6czjzBlFD85_Tdy9IbAMfJENaAE_A6RSPuVFGiEJFvTPJb4CmTh-6p2LOLG84uTL0XWg8I_bkKizT_pdW4LORsLOg2EF/s400/Ulu+Feather.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><i>Photo by Diane Scrafton Cohen Ferreira</i></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div>I reached out to Ulu (which is a shortened version of her middle name, Uluwehi, which is abbreviated from her full middle name, Kamali'iwahineuluwehi) and we exchanged messages, but we never connected to discuss the tattoo. Then, last month, I was in Hawai'i, at the home of Ulu and her husband Travis.<br /><br />For the record, despite my inkspotting ways, I was never sure if I'd have the opportunity on this trip to document all my nieces' and nephews' ink. I knew I'd be seeing them, but my purpose for doing so was not tattoo-related.<br /><br />But as you may have read over the last week, there I was at Ulu and Travis's place, hanging out with family, and the subject turned inky, and out came the camera.<br /><br />Still, I wasn't sure I would be seeing the tattoo from my mom's photo - Ulu was wearing a dress and I'm always walking on eggshells when it comes to lower back tattoos. But I was taking pictures of everyone else's tattoos and Ulu's back piece was mentioned. She happily changed into sweats so I could take a closer look at this amazing peacock feather tattoo:<br /><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimeNAJhQOa-G3Da3q4Iwab5qDl_Ur3xXPFOyNf1wdUpsgq_Yri4pKo8rmbPsaKR5ZtPzMKQO0H6hkWKs36gpPfL4Gs2l4YpJuyFLD2DeNHoEhJ_z2FIaqavjNLnqx1m27hDaH39BqW/s1600/Ulu+Feather+Crop.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimeNAJhQOa-G3Da3q4Iwab5qDl_Ur3xXPFOyNf1wdUpsgq_Yri4pKo8rmbPsaKR5ZtPzMKQO0H6hkWKs36gpPfL4Gs2l4YpJuyFLD2DeNHoEhJ_z2FIaqavjNLnqx1m27hDaH39BqW/s400/Ulu+Feather+Crop.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><br />One of the things I had always wondered was how far around the feather went. I got my answer soon enough:<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFrd9KhpFdJFka_zPPaK0p8IMInPWV90xx3jno0D4J4gmY9xc_1y6JsSmEHczVL6JUvzS3g9w5skj8baLrtsjk1baOH-WLsDAnZaLB7ofWjCF0i7yXlltN9pZFP3_LVilHEafGs5Za/s1600/Ulu+Feather+Wraparound.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFrd9KhpFdJFka_zPPaK0p8IMInPWV90xx3jno0D4J4gmY9xc_1y6JsSmEHczVL6JUvzS3g9w5skj8baLrtsjk1baOH-WLsDAnZaLB7ofWjCF0i7yXlltN9pZFP3_LVilHEafGs5Za/s400/Ulu+Feather+Wraparound.jpg" width="335" /></a></div><br /><br />As you can see the tattoo dips gracefully down after it rounds the hip. I'm glad I got to see this side because I was able to capture the detail in the color and the tiny pink butterfly near the tip of the quill:<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1opAy6o-xjs8xgMJzb6uBgd5kYOv02jFmSSDzTEIQ0K13LD30_88zGfQtAzCSOZmgrJ8ls9Q71BjpRdlL2EyoKbVQ5fwm1lCnRMZ0TAA2RAGBoGY003ofIZMEO9YV44iYjQdesK1c/s1600/Ulu+Feather+Wraparound+detail.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1opAy6o-xjs8xgMJzb6uBgd5kYOv02jFmSSDzTEIQ0K13LD30_88zGfQtAzCSOZmgrJ8ls9Q71BjpRdlL2EyoKbVQ5fwm1lCnRMZ0TAA2RAGBoGY003ofIZMEO9YV44iYjQdesK1c/s400/Ulu+Feather+Wraparound+detail.jpg" width="366" /></a></div><br /><br />Ulu got this, aside from the beauty of it, to cover up a "tramp stamp" [her words, not mine - no angry comments, please]. The original piece is covered by the eye of the peacock feather.<br /><br />The artist responsible for this incredible tattoo is <a href="http://www.myspace.com/libratat2">Libra</a>, who freelances in Hawai'i, but occasionally does guest spots at <a href="http://www.myspace.com/808tattoohawaii">808 Tattoo</a>, and was at <a href="http://www.eastsidetattoostudio.com/artists.html">East Side Tattoo Studio</a> at the time this was done.<br /><br />In that original email from Grandma Diane (my mom), she also included the tattoos of Travis, Ulu's husband.<br /><br />I had never met Travis before, but was welcomed by him as one of the family. I took my own photo of the forearm ink he wears, also by Libra, in honor of his and Ulu's children, Ezra and Trinity.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVNBRM7_fyb1JvFFtVTcoK65e7Xy2cci70XHNLUG6GHN8DjjXaWE9mef-hMNebK3C5vdfLTHBGsCmKG6EDEa7NAstrDfc-Y6oFc1kdAyTxR_SWKEN33P7clc6tGv-vSeTvWeoDQD1e/s1600/Travis+-+Ezra+Trinity.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="196" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVNBRM7_fyb1JvFFtVTcoK65e7Xy2cci70XHNLUG6GHN8DjjXaWE9mef-hMNebK3C5vdfLTHBGsCmKG6EDEa7NAstrDfc-Y6oFc1kdAyTxR_SWKEN33P7clc6tGv-vSeTvWeoDQD1e/s400/Travis+-+Ezra+Trinity.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div>My deepest and most sincere thanks to both Travis and Ulu, not only for their hospitality and kindness, but for sharing their tattoos with us here on Tattoosday.<br /><br />This concludes the "All in the Family" subset of the Tattoosday Goes to Hawai'i series. A warm <i>mahalo</i> to all of my nieces and nephews for letting their mainland uncle help share their tattoos with the Tattoosday community. <br /><br />Previously in the <i>Tattoosday Goes to Hawai'i - All in the Family</i> series:<br /><br /><a href="http://tattoosday.blogspot.com/2010/05/tattoosday-goes-to-hawaii-all-in-family.html">Part 1, A Preface</a> <br /><a href="http://tattoosday.blogspot.com/2010/05/tattoosday-goes-to-hawaii-all-in-family_19.html">Part 2, Keali'i's Sleeves</a><br /><a href="http://tattoosday.blogspot.com/2010/05/tattoosday-goes-to-hawaii-all-in-family_21.html">Part 3, Ikaika, In Progress</a><br /><a href="http://tattoosday.blogspot.com/2010/05/tattoosday-goes-to-hawaii-all-in-family_23.html">Part 4, Lehua's Eternal Tribute to Poppa John</a>

Tattoosday Goes To Hawai'i - All in the Family, Part 5 (Ulu's Amazing Plumage)

In January 2008, when Tattoosday was a mere infant blog, my mother sent me photos of some of the ink my cousins possessed. I already shared ...

Read more »