Vegvisir

This nifty tattoo comes from Rank My Tattoos and was created at Saint Sabrina's in Minneapolis. For an explanation of this fascinating device I turned to the experts at the International Planetarium Society. Now, pay attention as there will be a quiz later:

This instrument draws on the fact that the sun´s shadow from the tip in the middle of a disk describes different hyperbolas at different times of the year. When you have the hyperbola representing 62° and the four weeks around summer solstice, you don´t have to know the time of the day in order to find the general directions. All you have to do is rotate the disk until the shadow of the tip falls on the hyperbola, and the general directions are given with an accuracy of a few degrees. One of the ingenious things about navigating with this instrument is that if you should choose the wrong gnomon curve and get a course that is a little too much north in the morning, this will be corrected in the afternoon by a slightly south bound course-and your average direction will be correct.

Ya know, I'm such a moron when it comes to numbers and three dimensional thinking that I'm not sure I fully understand the above. But it sure is interesting. And it makes a nice tattoo!


And if this tattoo looks familiar that may be because the fabulous Bjork has this tattoo on her arm.

Pure White Tattoos

According to Mail Online the latest Hollywood craze is white tattoos. Purely white tattoos, that is, with no other color at all.

But white-ink tattoos have become an overnight success with a host of celebrity followers from supermodel Kate Moss to actress Lindsay Lohan.

The permanent designs are applied with a regular tattoo gun, yet use ink that is thicker and of a higher quality than normal to stand out on the skin.

I'm kinda on the fence about this. On the one hand, anyone who has ever had any white highlights on a tattoo knows that it will fade. No matter how little sun you get the white will eventually fade away leaving bare skin color underneath. So, in that sense getting a purely white tattoo seems like a waste of time, money, expertise and, not to mention, pain.

On the other hand, getting a purely white tattoo would be almost like getting a temporary tattoo in case the image/writing loses its appeal. So, I guess, if you've got the money to spend on a tattoo that won't last but a few years then it might seem like a good idea.

That said, you won't catch me spending precious tattoo funds on a white tattoo. How about you? I'd be interested to learn how others feel about white tattoos.

Betty Broadbent

This is the fabulous Betty Broadbent. She was the first person to be inducted into the Tattoo Hall of Fame and was probably the first famous woman with a full body suit tattoo. Born in 1909 she first encountered the world of tattoo at the tender age of 14. She eventually got a full suit from such pioneering tattoo artists as Charlie Wagner, Joe Van Hart, Jack Redcloud, Tony Rineager and Red Gibbons (who became her husband). She became a star in the sideshow circuit as one of the few heavily tattooed women and lived the circus life for some 40 years. She worked with all the major shows of the time: Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey Circus, Cole Brothers, Sells-Floto and others. She left the stage for a few years to perform with a wild west show and during the off season she tattooed in San Francisco. She retired from public life in 1967, settled in Florida and died peacefully in her sleep in 1983.

These are the bare facts of her life and about all I can find out about her online. I'm surprised and quite disappointed that I can't find any images of her own tattoo art on the internet. She may have been the first female tattoo artist. She was certainly one of the most famous female tattoo artists and I'm very interested in learning about the quality of her work. Considering how famous a figure she was/is it would seem natural for her art to be showcased somewhere but I've come up empty. She must have been tattooing through most of the 60s so there are surely people still alive with her art on their bodies, but I can't seem to find any of it. Perhaps there is a book out there somewhere but if anyone knows of online images of her work I'd love to hear about it.

The Iceman

These are just a few of the 50-some tattoos on the body of Otzi the Iceman, who has the distinction of being the oldest mummified human body ever found. He died around 5300 years ago, apparently as a result of murder, and was quickly buried by ice which kept his body from deteriorating completely. Being that many of his tattoos are near arthritic parts of his body it is widely believed that they were meant to be therapeutic. His tattoos are quite simple; no elaborate images here, they are only lines and groups of lines.

As you can see, his tattoos are all over his body. And while some of the tattoos appear near arthritic spots the same can't be said for all of Otzi's tattoos. The others may be purely artistic or signs of status. Otzi was not an average guy as he lived past the age of 50, double the average age of most folks in 3300 BCE. So, he must have been well-fed and had access to the medical care of the day. I find Otzi and his tattoos fascinating. Was he a nobleman of some sort to be so lucky to live so long? Was he a shaman to be blessed with so much ancient ink? We'll probably never know but I still thinks it's awesome that the oldest human body ever found had numerous tattoos.

P.S. I also think it's awesome that hometown boy Brad Pitt has Otzi on his arm.