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Trash Polka?


Iwar
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They look like shitty t shirt designs except someone forgot the shirt part!

I know some of you like the artwork but I just don't. To me it's nothing new, nothing interesting, nothing that should be tattooed. The back pieces to me just look fucking stupid and are going to look way stupider in 5-10 years when they turn into black blobs (first one already is black blobs ha!). The second back piece, I can't imagine how the white and pink will last more than 1-2 years. I'd be scared to get that much red in a tattoo without outlines.

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Just comes off as being a bit TOO derivative of Graphic Design AD work, which isn't something I would want permanently on my skin, so I agree with that sentiment expressed by people better versed than I. The whole stamped and/or type writer font wording on several of the examples posted by @Iwar leave me pretty cold.

BUT, the point about strong outlines made me think about Amanda Wachob, and I am curious what other people here think about her work in comparison and in contrast to work posted above.

Amanda-Wachob-4.jpg

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The first chicks arm does just look like some child painted on her, I'm sure that was the idea though.

My kids have always been big on drawing on themselves, I think like most kids. Unlike most parents, we don't tell them no, or to stop. It was actually one of my son's preschool teachers that decided my son could color on himself in any fashion, saying that it was our "family culture." That being said, my two yr old daughter's "tattoos," as she calls them, rarely look as good, placement wise, as that first picture.

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Visually I like hers better but I wouldn't get a tattoo like that, same reasons as before pretty much. The first chicks arm does just look like some child painted on her, I'm sure that was the idea though. I think it's stupid.

Oh, I don't know. Maybe Jackson Pollack minus, of course, the texture. They actually remind me a bit of a video I saw about bioluminescence.

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Regarding the original Trash Polka tattoos, I would not have one done on me and I agree that they seem faddy, but I certainly recognise and appreciate the technical ability required to execute them. They certainly look like tattoos to me, albeit clearly different to (and perhaps deliberately in contrast to) most mainstream tattooing. I guess there are so many dreadful tattooists doing technically very bad work, but that many would consider to be recognisably 'tattoos', that I find it hard to dismiss this work which is at least shows talent and application to the task. Not a popular opinion, I know.

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My personal problem with this stuff is that it doesn't deal with or derive from the basic motivations of humans or society.

All the long-lasting tattoo imagery addresses or springs from some basic element of humanity. Which is why they've lasted a long time.

My opinion is that this style of work (trash polka et al) is created with the main motivation to stand out from the crowd or be 'different'.

The drive to be original, different or special, is fundamentally flawed and certainly short-lived.

If tattoo designs derive from deep-rooted human drives and archetypes it's pretty much impossible for the concept to become dated. The execution is a different matter.

In my opinion all the best tattoo imagery comes from or symbolises basic human drives, or the needs of humans in society. Skulls, pin-ups, powerful animals, flowers, hearts, religious imagery, daggers etc, etc.

Most of the flash or portfolios (including tribal) in a decent tattoo shop will succinctly encompass the interesting bits of the human experience.

That's why the work posted in this thread rings hollow for me, regardless of the difficulty of the application.

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