Alex Shares Three Elements of an Amazing Sleeve

I'm not sure why it has taken so long to post Alex's tattoos - when I met him at the end of May in K-Mart @ Penn Station, I was totally stoked by his ink. Perhaps I was just letting the photos simmer as I waited for the right time to share them. Nevertheless, here they are, finally.

What we're seeing are three portions of Alex's left arm sleeve, beginning with this segment which is the most impressive part of the work:

 

As Alex explains, this tattoo is

"inspired by the carvings in Cambodia in Siem Reap ... it's one of the temples of Indra, Indian god of thunder ... he's also the god of change and progress ... 

 ... He's very human-like because he messes up a lot ... he's somewhat of a womanized, so it makes him very original from the rest of the Indian gods..."

At the top of Alex's arm is this symbol:

He told me that this is the logo of a hard rock group from Brooklyn called Life of Agony.

You can check out their website here or peruse their Amazon catalog here.

In the photo above, you get a glimpse of the third and final segment of Alex's sleeve which we're seeing today, which features this familiar face:

That's the symbolic face of  Steeplechase Park on Coney Island.

Compare to this tattoo, which appeared here last year.

Alex explained about his connection to Coney Island:

"...Basically, I grew up there ... I grew up in Bensonhurst, but [Coney Island] is kind of where I became myself, adolescence and all that stuff - that's the old Coney Island..."

Alex credited all of his work to a tattoo artist named Seth Wood who is currently working out of Saved Tattoo in Brooklyn.

Thanks to Alex for sharing this amazing work with us here on Tattoosday!

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Fabiana's Saraswati Tattoo

First of all, let me first thank all my visitors who helped me get 10,000 hits in the month of June alone. That's more than the first five months of Tattoosday (September '07 to February '08, combined). I am grateful for your interest and hope you continue to visit us here.

Above is another one of Fabiana's tattoos. It is located on her inner left bicep and is the Saraswati, the Hindu goddess of arts, knowledge and music.
Fabiana first learned about this goddess while reading a Tori Amos book (probably this one) and thought Saraswati "was so beautiful....I knew she would bring me strength and knowledge".


This piece was inked by Lou Andrew, the owner and artist at Third Eye Tattoos in Brooklyn.

Fabiana's ink has appeared previously on Tattoosday here.

Thanks again to Fabiana for sharing her body art here! If you like her ink, don't worry there's more appearing here later this month!!

Kali Takes Manhattan

Ronda J. is a painter/musician from New York City who wears this beautiful tattoo on her left bicep.

This is the Hindu goddess Kali, who is often associated with death and destruction, although she more accurately represents change.


This tattoo is a traditional image of Kali, with one significant exception. Whereas she is usually pictured standing upon the deity Shiva, this incarnation has her standing on a city aflame. Ronda J. points out that the burning metropolis is New York City.


It should be noted, she points out, that the flames reach highest behind the two twin towers in the lower right section of the tattoo:

This is of course the World Trade Center, but the piece was completed in 1997, four years before 9/11. This makes the tattoo that much more haunting.

This remarkable work was inked by Elio Espana at Fly-Rite Studio in Brooklyn. Work from Elio and Fly-Rite has appeared on Tattoosday previously here and here.

Ronda J. is a self-described Kali-initiate. Hindu mysticism takes on many forms, and I got the distinct impression that her faith in Kali was multi-layered, and by proxy, her connection to this tattoo and its meaning was exceptionally complex.

Thanks to Ronda J. for sharing her tattoo here at Tattoosday!