PRESENTATION ON EVOLUTION OF TATTOOS

By Nidhi Jadhav

• The practice of tattooing means different things in different cultures. In early practice, decoration appears to have been the most common motive for tattooing, and that still holds true today.

• In some cultures, tattoos served as identification of the wearer’s rank or status in a group. For example, the early Romans tattooed slaves and criminals. Tahitian tattoos served as rites of passage, telling the history of the wearer’s life.

• Boys reaching manhood received one tattoo to mark the occasion, while men had another style done when they married.

• Sailors traveling to exotic foreign lands began to collect tattoos as souvenirs of their journeys , and tattoo parlours sprang up in port cities around the globe.

• The art of tattooing took a long time to find its place in the world despite its powerful potential.

• Eventually, globalization prevailed and tattooing took root in Western societies, where in the early Twentieth Century few innovators found ways of using electricity to drive a needle fast enough that it could be used as a pen.

• Tattooing has evolved into a full-fledged artistic medium that is plugged into a global network and applied with an endless variety of sophisticated techniques.

• Nurtured in an environment of economic prosperity, combined with freedom of expression and the diverse influence of thriving subcultures worldwide, contemporary tattooing is arguably one of the fastest and most explosive renaissances ever known in the history of art.

• Before electricity, the ink had to be literally hammered in, leaving little opportunity for precision or subtlety. With the invention of the electric tattoo machine, all of the things we see in skin today were made possible.

• The new artistic ideal of slowing down and working more carefully has helped bring about all kinds of advances in machines, pigments, tubes and all sorts of other tattooing essentials.

• The modern electric tattoo machine, although basically unchanged for over 100 years, has been refined in many aspects and now can be tuned to puncture the skin in exactly the artist’s desired manner.

• Tattooing methods have recently benefited from ergonomics, the science of making equipment that fits the user.

• Ergonomics have brought about developments in practical aspects of tattooing including machine weight, the shape of the tube grip, modern massage tables and adjustable chairs; these innovations have made both the artist and client more comfortable and allow for more productive sessions.

PROCESS AND ADVANCEMENT

• Currently, the state of the art of tattooing is such that basically any image can be tattooed on skin with almost photographic realism.

• One of the few real limitations we’re facing now is in our understanding of what exactly makes a tattoo design successful, of what combination of elements will have the greatest visual impact while having the most flattering effect on the body that wears it.

• Each style of tattooing has some particular artistic direction that it explores more closely than other styles.

• With the tattoo profession being gradually taken over by experienced artists, we’re seeing many modern illustrative styles being tattooed, from comic book art to futuristic computer-generated designs.

PRESENT

• Pigment has also evolved in exciting ways.

• Almost every color in the spectrum is now available from many different suppliers using numerous different kinds of pigment.

• Tattoos have been around for centuries for medicinal, decorative, and various other reasons. Presently, they are used more as an extension of a person's sense of fashion or to show their religious or gang affiliations.

Tattoo Timeline

3200 B.C. Ötzi, who would become the world’s oldest mummy, gets a tattoo: about 60 lines and crosses on his lower spine, right knee, and ankle joints.

Third Century A.D.In the late 200s, Japanese men are elaborately decorating their entire bodies.

1769 Captain James Cook sails into Tahiti and discovers Polynesian tattoos, along with the island’s word for the art form: tatau.

1846 Martin Hildebrandt sets up New York’s first tattoo shop on Oak Street in lower Manhattan.

1891 New Yorker Samuel O’Reilly patents the first electric tattoo machine, a modification of Thomas Edison’s perforating pen.

1944 In one of the first instances of legal trouble for the tattoo world, Charlie Wagner is fined by the city of New York for not sterilizing his needles.

1961 The New York City Health Department bans tattooing after a hepatitis-B scare.

1974 Don Ed Hardy opens Realistic Tattoo in San Francisco, the first custom-only, appointment-only studio in the U.S.

1979 The three-year-old National Tattoo Association organizes the first National Convention of tattoo artists and fans, in Denver.

April 1984 Inventor Keith Relyea and 3M develop and patent a temporary tattoo that lasts longer and looks better than previous food-coloring-based versions.

1992 The Alliance of Professional Tattooists, a nonprofit founded to address the tattoo industry’s health and safety issues, is established.

1994 Johnny Depp changes his former proclamation of love to “Wino Forever.”

February 1997 New York passes a bill legalizing tattooing by a vote of 38 to 7. Officials estimate that 50 tattooists had been operating illegally in the previous few years.

May 1997 New York holds its first tattoo convention.

1999 Mattel releases Butterfly Art Barbie, a doll with washable body art.

December 2004 The launch of Ed Hardy Vintage Tattoo Wear, a clothing line featuring the artwork of the famed tattooist.

September 2005 9/11-memorial tattoos become a distinct genre at tattoo competitions.

February 2006 Paul Booth, the first tattooist to be invited to join the National Arts Club, opens a high-end tattoo atelier in Chelsea.

May 2007 Brad Pitt gets a tattoo of Ötzi the mummy.

Thank you