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TATTOOING
AND THE ART OF PINUP The beauty of pinup art has long seduced both tattooist and client. Whether derived from classic cheesecake of the 1940s or from more contemporary, fetish imagery, pinups continue to inspire a million tattoos. Many tattooists base their work on the three godfathers of pinup, Alberto Vargas, Gil Elvgren and George Petty, who were at their peak in the mid-twentieth century. But which contemporary pinup painters are both widely admired and extensively copied by today's tattooists? Out of all the talented practitioners of the art form working today, three top the list: David Nestler, Armando Huerta and Andrew Bawidamann. Looking at their amazing paintings, it's not hard to see why.
As well as requiring an enormous amount of talent, painting with brushes takes Nestler a huge amount of time. On average, each painting takes from fifty to eighty hours to create. So how does he produce these super-realistic images? "The trick is in the way I layer the acrylic paint," he confides. "I water down the pigment and then build it up layer upon layer, so the saturation of the color comes up very slowly." In terms of life's ambitions, being an artist is all David ever wanted to be. He started his career studying fine art at the University of Pittsburgh. However, Nestler soon became disillusioned with fine art and switched to commercial art. He continued his studies at the Art Institute, where he trained to become an illustrator. David's main talent was, and still is, painting people and, in particular, his uncanny ability to capture a sitter's likeness. He was especially attracted to painting beautiful women and, understandably, it's a passion that has never left him. After leaving college, David moved to Hollywood to pursue his dream of being a movie poster designer. But, in the mid-'80s, the industry shifted away from traditional illustration to photomontage. So, Nestler shifted gears once again and took up illustration work for advertising and design studios. Over the years, he has worked in all areas of the entertainment industry, including film, TV and radio. He has also worked extensively in book and magazines, including covers for major publications like TV Guide. Then he accidentally stumbled into the world of pinup art, and his creative focus shifted once again. "A photographer friend invited me to go to the first Glamourcon in 1995," he recalls. "This was an L.A.-based convention, that specialized in pinup art. I was blown away, when I got a chance to really see what the best pinup painters were capable of. Artists like Olivia, Hajime Sorayama, Dave Stevens, Jim Silk and Robert Blue. I was familiar with classic pinup art, but, for the first time, I realized there was a whole new market for contemporary work." Duly inspired, David went back to Pittsburgh with his head spinning. "I spent the next year researching the market and trying to come up with a series of images that would get me noticed in the field," he remembers. A dealer then asked him to produce a cheesecake pinup image, heavily influenced by the Gil Elvgren classic called "The Graduate." "She sold it immediately and asked me to do more," he explains. "I refused. It was merely creating something someone had done before." So, David searched for new inspiration and found it in black-and-white erotic photography. He also found a lot of visually interesting ideas in the fetish world. But it wasn't an area in which he felt entirely comfortable. "I disliked the darkness and fear associated with the dominance and submission imagery," he reveals. "So I came up with a sort of blend between glamour and bondage. I replaced all the usual fetish clichés-ball gags, whips and chains-with satin ribbons. It was more about exploring the different ways of wrapping women up, rather than tying them up." From this experiment emerged David's first pinup series, Blond and Gagged. The series was an instant success. Within months, he had succeeded in gaining the attention of Playboy magazine and, of course, it generated a shockwave throughout the tattoo community. It was at a comic book convention that David met a tattooist called Marc Draven, from City Limits Tattoo in Florida. "He told me that tattooists were copying my images," says Nestler. "I was utterly amazed." Marc then persuaded David to bring his work to a tattoo convention in Tampa, Florida. "Initially, I was very pessimistic about selling anything," he admits. "I'd done specialized conventions and I thought I knew the markets. But, much to my surprise, it turned out to be one of the best shows I've ever done." Instead of being bent out of shape that his art was being copied, David took the generous attitude that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. "It's different when someone copies my art and then tries to sell it on eBay. That sucks. But when I see my art tattooed on someone's skin, I view it as the ultimate compliment." David's enlightened attitude towards tattooists copying his work is backed up with more than just words. On his website he offers any tattooist wanting to adapt his work a free copy of the black-and-white line art that forms the basis of his paintings. "I've met some of the world's best tattooists," he says, "and they are also great artists. But a lot of tattooists are still developing their drawing skills. I want to encourage these tattooists to do a decent job, so I provide them the line art to give them a short cut." David also helps tattooists improve their technique by holding regular seminars at tattoo conventions. Since their meeting at the comic convention, Marc Draven and David Nestler have become good friends. Marc has done many copies of David's published work as well as tattoos of designs specifically created by David for his clients. Marc is also one of his biggest fans: "David's ability to get photorealist images from just a paint brush is second to none," he enthuses. Realizing that the worlds of tattooing and multimedia art have much to profit from each other, Draven has initiated a project called Ink Fusion, which aims to bring these professions together. "Many comic book, movie and art fans are skeptical about entering a tattoo studio," he explains. "So, what I do is bring tattooing into their backyard. By bringing tattooists like David to various art conventions, they can get first-hand experience of what the tattooist is capable of doing creatively. It's a great education for them and takes the fear out of the unknown." Another phenomenally popular Nestler image with tattooists is the Miki's School of Rock series. David originally designed it for the music market, but wanted it to be completely accessible. "I've tended to stay away from full-frontal nudity, because it limits where the image can be shown," he admits. He believes the popularity of the Miki series stems from it being sexy, but not likely to offend. "It's cute and it has a lot of attitude, but there isn't too much flesh on display." David is currently enjoying his huge success in the pinup genre. After years in the salt mines of advertising, with art directors always telling him what to do, he revels in his newfound freedom. "At last I get to wake up each morning and decide exactly what I want to do. The fact that much of that creative freedom involves painting beautiful women, is just icing on the cake."
Larry Brogan from Tattoo City in Lockport, Illinois is a tattooist who admires Armando. A highly accomplished artist who does amazing pinup tattoos, he considers Armando one of his favorite painters. "I've been in love with his work since he first started putting it out in the U.S.," he says. Larry has done numerous tattoos based on Armando's paintings and has bought several of his originals. "I love the look he creates," says Brogan. "The images are highly stylized but also extremely realistic. There is a certain flare and attitude you just don't find in other pinup painters." Despite the rebel image he projects in both his paintings and his publicity portraits, when I talked to Armando on the phone he was quite soft-spoken and polite. Although Armando's paintings exhibit an amazing level of technical ability and talent, he is, in fact, mostly self-taught. Huerta trained as a graphic designer in Mexico, but the curriculum did not involve painting or drawing. His attraction to pinup art began when he saw the work of top artists like Olivia and Hajime Sorayama in books. "I looked at these paintings and thought, My God, how do they do that?" Determined to see if he could emulate their technique, Armando tried teaching himself from a basic tutorial in the back of one of Sorayama's books. "I tried to copy one of his painting, but I couldn't achieve even ten percent of his ability." Undeterred, Armando labored on for two years, until he had finally reached a satisfying level of expertise. His persistence
paid off. Today, his work is much in demand both from private commissions,
magazine illustration and corporate advertising. His work frequently
appears in Mexican Playboy and advertising work for clients like
Coca Cola. Another huge fan is Steve Peace, who owns Immaculate Concept Tattoo in Calgary, Canada. Peace has tattooed around twenty of Armando's designs and recently invited Armando and David Nestler to his tattoo convention in Calgary. "I think his paintings translate really well into the tattoo medium," says Peace. " Eventually, I'd like to create my own pinups rather than copy other artists," he states. "And if I could create anything even close to an Armando Huerto, it would be an amazing achievement." Huerta explains that the images tattooists most frequently copy are his versions of Bettie Page and his sexy cartoon characters he calls Whoops. "I was attending an art show recently," he says, "and I saw this guy who was completely covered in tattoos. It was the coolest thing I've ever seen. He had every character I'd ever created tattooed on his body."
It's not surprising that Andrew has such a strong connection to the military, since practically everyone in his family, except himself, has been in the service. "My brother was in Iraq for two years," he states. "My cousin is a Ranger. My aunt and uncle are U.S. Navy corpsmen. The way our family bonds is to sit around watching old John Wayne military movies." Andrew's discovery of the classic pinup art adored by the U.S. World War II military came at an early age. "I grew up five minutes away from Wright Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio," he recalls. "We didn't have much money and the museum on the base was free, so, my folks would take me there all the time. I got to see all this amazing nose art on the bombers and on the jackets. It totally inspired me." Andrew has a deep admiration for artists like Vargas, Elvgren and Petty, whose pinup art dominated the 1940s and adorned a thousand aircraft. "To me, the pinup is a timeless medium," he explains. "It won't ever go away. I didn't get into painting pinups for the money. I just love it. People have this nostalgic love of the past. It's as if they are trying to reconnect with something that no longer exists. It's a powerful thing." Like David and Armando, Andrew is flattered that so many tattooists copy his images. "I don't have a problem with that," he admits. "They aren't making T-shirts or other merchandise, which would be taking money out of my pocket. I'm proud they love my paintings. To me, the tattoo is a walking billboard for my work." The technique Andrew uses to create his beautiful images is a combination of drawing by hand and then scanning the images into Adobe Illustrator, where he can manipulate them. These images are then placed on T-shirts and coffee mugs, etc. If he is doing an original painting, the process is far more laborious. "I use one-shot enamel. It's the same paint that hot rod guys use to pinstripe their cars. It's really tough to use, but it's the only paint that will create the clean lines I need." One of these paintings can take him up to one hundred and twenty hours to complete. As well as tattooists requesting his work, Andrew is frequently asked by the military to do commissions. "That can be difficult, as they usually want it quickly and they have no idea how long it takes me to do." Recently, a Green Beret contacted him from Iraq. "He said to me, 'Hey, bro. You have no idea how big your stuff is out here in the desert.' They asked Andrew to produce a Green Beret Girl. "I said, 'If you are serious, phone me and we will talk. Next thing I know, I get this call from a secured satellite phone and I can hear the desert wind howling in the background." The Green Berets scrapped together enough cash and Andrew produced the design and had shirts made and shipped to the troops. "They were so happy, it just made their day." Increasingly, Andrew is attending various tattoo conventions. "I have a lot of friends who are tattooists," he states. "It's a good fit, because I make art that really appeals to them. Like all artists, they are looking for new inspiration and finding something completely new can be quite challenging." So what about the future? "Well, I'm just trying as hard as I can to get rich and famous," he says , laughing. And with talent like Bawidamann's, that should not be too far off. |
