AARON BELL VISITS THE MILAN CONVENTION
Words and photos by Aaron Bell

It was a nine-hour flight from Seattle to Copenhagen (three-hour layover at the airport), a two hour flight to Malpensa, Italy, an hour bus ride to the Milan train station and, finally, a cab drive to the hotel where the Milan Tattoo Convention would take place. The hotel Quark is located in an industrial area on the outskirts of town. Yes, it was quite a journey to get here but, hey, it's Italy! Besides, the process of getting here was relatively smooth compared to last year, when my wife lost our credit cards at the airport and all the taxi drivers were on strike. And, of course, in Northern Italy no one seems to speak English.

This year, I attended the event with my co-worker Josh Schwegel. We arrived at the hotel late and tired. We stopped by the bar and said hello to Paul Jefferies. He talked a bit about the first Italian tattoo convention in Rome in the '80s which, I believe, Don Ed Hardy helped organize. I guess there was a major mob presence and gypsies were sneaking through the back and stealing dirty tattoo equipment. Then Paul ranted for a while about his travels in Asia. He mentioned something about a shop in Bangkok professing to be the only true shop in town with professional sterile practice, while their dirty tattooing equipment whirled around inside a hot dog rotisserie just inside the door. On that note, we cut out and went to bed.

THE FIRST MORNING
We woke up early with a full day to play before the show. We went to the Duomo-Milan Catherdral, a breathtaking gothic structure in the heart of the city. Although this was the second time I've seen it, this magnificent structure blew me away just like the first time. It was built in 1376 and took 20 years to complete. When gazing upon this monstrous gothic structure, one can see where many European artists such as H.R. Geiger drew their inspiration. On the ceiling next to a small red light is one of the nails from Jesus Christ's cross. The cathedral is crowned on top by a solid gold, lifesize cherub. I heard the Mafia actually tried to steal it with a helicopter.

After this, we wandered into a local shop owned by Claudio Pittan, where I ran into Troy Denning with his wife and sister. Troy is one of those guys whose work I've always appreciated but I'd never had the good fortune of meeting. Claudio was quite hospitable and took us to see his private studio down the street. After this, we piled into a cab and returned to the hotel where we met some arriving tattooists and went out to eat with Brad Fink, Kevin Leblanc, Jason Kundell, Masa from Three Tides in Japan and Eric Rieth. We had a good time although most of us agreed that the food tasted like Franco-American.

We returned to the hotel to discover that many tattooists had arrived. Among them were Filip Leu, Paul Booth, Chris Garver, Horitaka, Bob Tyrell, Shige, Henning Jorgensen, Mike Rubendall and Juan Puente, to name a few. There were also many industry people and friends such as Miki Vialetto (the organizer of the show), Travelin' Mick and Maeda and Kawasaki from Tattoo Burst in Japan. Yeah, this was going to be a good one!

DAY ONE
Tired as hell and a bad case of jet leg. Frank from Last Rites asked if I'd do Art Fusion with the first group. For those of you who are unfamiliar with it, this is an event which Paul Booth and Filip Leu rolled out a few years ago. A group of five artists get on stage and work on five art pieces with pastels or charcoal and alternate every five minutes. The end result is usually pretty interesting. Anyway, I agreed to do it, although I had no idea who else would be in the group. Sometimes an overconfident knucklehead with little artistic talent squeezes his way into the group. This can be frustrating because, instead of working towards completion, the group spends most of its time fixing the stuff that the one guy is doing. That's when I reminded myself to take it easy; we're not here to create a masterpiece. We're just here to have fun and learn from one another. Even that knucklehead has something to teach me, such as patience and tolerance. My group consisted mostly of European artists. There was Giancarlo Capra from Pellirossa Tattoo in Italy, Sieto from the Netherlands, Federica, Taz, and Eric Rieth. I was especially pleased to have Giancarlo on my team. We were both involved in the first Art Fusion in Worcester, Massachusetts. One year later he exhibited at Art Camp in San Francisco during the Tattoo the Earth Tour. Having practiced Art Fusion with his group three days a week for the entire year prior, they proceeded to blow our minds. It was amazing what this group had accomplished. Man, their art was polished! Those Pellirossa guys are truly a testament to what a group can accomplish with practice, dedication and mutual cooperation. Although the art pieces of the day's event had their weak points, I felt that this group of drawings came out pretty decent. A lot of the things I did not like about this set of drawings were things that I had done. Eeeek! Maybe I'm the knucklehead!

DAY TWO
The next day, I woke up refreshed with the first decent rest since I'd arrived (with the exception of interruptions by a pack of wild dogs in the field outside my hotel room). We ate the huge buffet-style breakfast at the hotel and indulged in cappuccinos from the self-serve espresso machine. After that, we hit the floor to set up for the day's appointments. I was going to be doing a pinup nurse on a German tattoo artist. We were among the first on the floor, so we decided to seize the opportunity and check out the booths and see just who was working the show. The booths here are interesting. Rather than the standard pipe and drape, the booths consist of sheets of plywood. This gives you a lot of wall space to hang artwork, which makes for a more visual show. We had a great spot, center middle row. Across from us was Paul Booth's Last Rites, next of him was Madrid's Robert Hernandez. On the other side was Tin-Tin and then Filip Leu's booth. To my right was Boris from Hungary and on the other side was Paul Jeffries. Next to Paul was Henning Jorgensen and the rest of the crew from Tattoo Elite.

As the day progressed, the crowd moved in. Many American soldiers that were stationed in Italy hung around our booth. Italy seems to be the place they go before being deployed to Afghanistan. Most were familiar with our shop and were happy to have some fellow Americans to converse with. I know we were, and we'd only been here a few days. We all climbed up on chairs and tried to peek over the crowd at the show where some sexy Italian lady was fondling what looked to be a rather large python, as we covered our ears from the deafening soundtrack of Conan the Barbarian. As the announcer informed the crowd of something in Italian, I thought of all the foreign tattoo artists that travel to conventions in the States. I had never really thought about what they go through or what it must be like for them with the language barrier. Also, as I peered across the crowd, I thought about how glad I was that in Italy, as of January 1, all indoor smoking had been banned. That was a surprise. I mean, this is the country that was known for smoking in gyms and hospitals! Last year, I recall seeing billboard signs with glamorous models smoking. Anyway, it sure was nice actually being able to breathe and see the stage. Also, there will be no blisters on the pages of my portfolio from reckless drunken smokers. Midnight finally rolled around and it was off to bed.

SUNDAY
Finally, Sunday morning and the jet lag and sleep depravation had really kicked in. I popped some aspirin, shower, hit the buffet and the self-serve cappuccino machine (yahoo!). I made my way out onto the floor and set up for my appointment. I thought to myself, Cool, this will be a chill day. Sundays are usually slow. I had a short appointment. The rest of the day I would be free to walk around and chat with other tattooists and pop a few pictures for this article. Fast forward two hours. Slammed! Wall to wall people. It took me a half hour just to get to the bathroom and back. Fridays and Sundays at tattoo conventions can be very unpredictable, as they are generally about four hours shorter than Saturdays. The admission price is usually the same for all days, so most people opt for Saturday. I was really surprised to see a Sunday turnout like this. Okay, so I'll move to plan B. Sell! I marked all my merchandise down in price (as many people do on the last day of a show). I seemed to have jinxed my new prints by putting Milano '05 on them, because I really hadn't sold anything yet. Upon talking to others over the past few days, most agreed that, although the crowds were present, retail was not doing well. So, here I was being the car salesman excitedly rambling on about all the great deals I was offering on prints to a crowd who don't speak English. Although many Europeans speak some English, I've found few Italians do. I sold all my T-shirts and concluded that I'd be bringing a lot of prints home. I stuffed them under the table, took a deep breath and braved the crowd. I worked my way toward the stage where Paul Booth, Filip Leu and a few others were beginning their Art Fusion project, to get a few shots for the article.

ALL DONE
After the show, we went out to eat with a bunch of artists. We were escorted by an Italian tattooer who used to work in the States for a while. She was kind of cute and, although there are a few things that I can vividly remember about her, her name is not one of them. The food was awesome! True, fine Italian dining at decent prices?finally! As I ate the meal, I pondered the events of the last few days. I thought to myself just how great it was to be working at a show with so many talented artists and mingling with them in the off hours. In fact, I need to remind myself of this when I total my expenses for this trip. I shelled out the highest price I've ever paid for a booth. The dollar is really weak and, when you factor in all the travel expenses, it kind of hurts. But hey, it's Italy!

The next morning, we caught the train to Rome. We got a good dose of artistic inspiration for a few days and then caught a cheap flight to Brussels, Belgium. We decided to go there to check out Tatu Tattoo, a tattoo exhibit (obviously) at the Musees Royaux d'Art et d'Histoire. I feel pretty cultured and worldly just having written that but, honestly, I haven't a clue how to pronounce it. There are two primary languages in Brussels, French and Dutch. Unfortunately, English did not make the cut for this museum exhibit. Nonetheless, we enjoyed looking at flayed tattooed skins, antique tattooing instruments from different cultures and complete vintage tattooing setups from Milton Zeis and others. They had a mock setup of a "modern studio" complete with loud punk rock music and all. As I peered through the window at this part of the exhibit, I reflected for a moment just how far tattooing has come. It was strange being at a world renowned museum scrutinizing my industry from a world perspective. Although I could not read any of the text, it seemed that, overall, it was portrayed in a positive light. I left this museum and the continent of Europe feeling inspired and proud to be part of this amazing business.

-Aaron Bell
Slave to the Needle
Seattle, Washington