FEATURE ARTICLE—November 2003
WHAT'S UP DOWN UNDER? by Suzanne Sharp
Skin & Ink has never done a story on the tattoo scene in Australia, and it's odd we never see any submissions in the Reader's Gallery. "I wonder why," said the Editor. "Perhaps there's a story there."
I agreed, and immediately began trolling the Web for shops in Sydney, but kept coming up with a very short list. In disbelief, I shot off a few e-mails only to learn that some of the people I inquired about had disappeared. Could it really be that in greater Sydney, an area of 965 square miles and home to 4.1 million people, more than one-fifth of Australia's population, there were only 12 tattoo shops? By comparison, the City of Los Angeles, 465 square miles with a population of 3.8 million, has nearly 200.
Armed with my preliminary list and a map, I was off. Fourteen hours and 40 minutes after leaving LAX, I arrived in Sydney on a sunny April Saturday, the beginning of fall. It used to be that Sydney was likened to Los Angeles in the '50s―a sunlit, beach culture and backwater to Melbourne. Today, the capital city of the state of New South Wales is the financial and trade center of Australia. Indeed, tall buildings in the Central Business District cast shadows that virtually block out the sun.
The first thing I did when I got to my room was look at the Yellow Pages under Tattooing. Netting out the body piercing and cosmetic tattoo shops, I counted a grand total of 26 tattoo shops, 13 of which, I learned, were an hour's drive away. Next, I called Cliffe Clayton, owner of Inner Vision Tattoo, who had invited me to dinner. After we fixed a pick-up time, I hit the sack for a quick nap.
At 7:30, Cliffe and his girlfriend, Lou, pulled up in her 1965 Holden and off we went for a rolling tattoo shop tour of Sydney's environs, with time out for dinner at the Razors Edge Risotto Cafe in Enmore. Named after the 1946 movie starring Tyrone Power, the restaurant is co-owned by one of Cliffe's clients, Wayne Brown. We were shown to the little garden area in back, complete with pond and flamingos, where we fine-tuned my list and polished off a delicious meal.
The next day, Sunday, was my birthday, so I treated myself to a concert at the Opera House, followed by a ferry ride to Darling Harbour, where I had hoped to catch some of the Songkran Festival, the Thai New Year's celebration. Australia had an official "whites only" immigration policy until 1973. Today, four percent of the country's population is Asian, supporting Sydney's claim to be the most multi-cultural city in the Asia Pacific and, incidentally, spicing up the city's shopping, restaurant and tattoo scenes in the process. Too late for Thai, I settled for seafood at Jordon's, while the sun on the last of a beautiful weekend.
BEACHY, BEACHY
I decided to visit shops in a geographic sequence, heading for the beaches on Monday. With the sky overcast, it was too chilly
to sit in the bow for the half-hour ferry ride to Manly. And, when we got to the mouth of Sydney Harbour, where it opens to the Tasman Sea, we were really rockin' 'n' rollin', so I was glad to be indoors. Although Manly looks
like a family vacation destination complete with aquarium, kids water park, miles of beach and red-roofed homes dotting the hillside, locals prize it as the best beach for surfing. Yet, with more than six million day-trippers
and long-stay visitors annually, Manly has only one tattoo shop.
MANLY TATTOO, 18 Whistler Street, Manly 2095 NSW. Phone: (02) 99774145.
This shop is owned by people who are members of the Finks Motorcycle Club. Rick Torrens, who splits his week between here and a shop in Blacktown, 40 miles west of downtown Sydney, started in the business in 1996 as "the run-around boy" at Kiwi Kim's in Newtown. After two years, he "jumped in the deep end" at Harry's Tattoo World in Darlinghurst, and has been tattooing in Manly for the past two years.
Carmen Thompson, began her four and one-half year tattoo career at Manly Tattoo. A girl on the go, she's been to the States three times in the past six years, and has worked for a few days each in Pasadena, Hollywood and Baltimore. "When you work at different shops, you pick up new things and see how other tattooists work." Determined to immigrate to the U.S. in two years, she's paying off her credit cards and working on getting a visa.
Though the tourist traffic is non-stop in summer, December through March, Carmen's clients are locals"pilots, hospital industry, laborers, carpenters, a real cross section." Tourists come from England, New Zealand, Switzerland and Brazil. They love the beaches here and get small things like Chinese symbols, tribal and script, while her other clients bring in their own designs or they'll the artists to draw stuff for them. Lately people like dragons.
While it's easy to get from Manly to Bondi, one ferry and one bus, it takes more than an hour and a half. I headed straight for the world-famous beach which I'd passed in the dark on my first night in town. I have to admit to being disappointed. Bondi Beach is only one mile long and not all that wide. In summer, 60,000 people pack this piece of sand. Talk about standing room only! There are two tattoo shops in Bondi, although only one is listed in the phone book. Nearby in Edgecliff is a shop that no one I talked to had ever heard of.
KALEIDOSCOPE TATTOO & PIERCING, 280 Bondi Road, Bondi, NSW 2026. Phone: (02) 9365 0167. www.ktattoo.com.au. Open seven days from 12 noon.
Owned by Luciano Lima from Sao Paulo, Brazil, one of a family of four tattoo artists, brother Fabio works here and the others have shops in Rome and Sao Paulo. Tattooing since 1985, Luciano has worked in London, in Italy at his brother's shop, in Sardinia and in Ibiza. In 1989, he was working in Bali and visited a friend in Sydney. Instantly liking the place, he decided he wanted to open a shop here. After working at different shops around town, he opened Kaleidoscope in 1995.
With artists from three continents, Kaleidoscope has a very international flavor that is reflected in the work. Luciano does all styles but prefers Polynesian, Japanese, wildlife and portrait work. Fabio's specialty is fine line and small work. Claudio, from Florence, Italy, worked at Black Wave with Leo Zulueta and favors tribal, Polynesian and traditional American. Tong from Chiang Mai, Thailand, specializes in Japanese and Thai-inspired artwork. Sam from Aotearoa, New Zealand, does black-and-gray and portrait work. The shop also has guest artists, from time to time.
"A lot of our local customers are on their way to bodysuits, though they might not realize it yet," says Luciano. International tourists ask for commemorative tattoos like kangaroos and koalas, while those from Australia "get a lot of frangipani flowers and the Southern Cross, symbols of Australia." Tourists are mostly Europeans, Americans and Canadians, "but we get people from all over." Local clients are artists, small business owners, some corporate people and musicians. From his beach-side vantage point, Luciano sees tattooing to be very popular in Sydney. "Australians are very passionate about skin art. It's a very big culture."
CITY LIGHTS
TONY COHEN'S ILLUSTRATED MAN STUDIO, 228a Elizabeth Street, Sydney NSW. Phone: 02 9211 3761, fax 02 9281 8478. www.theillustratedman.com.au. Open noon to midnight
Monday-Saturday, noon to 6 p.m. on Sunday.
The only shop in Sydney with a Sydney address, this is a really busy street shop with people walking in for questions, prices and appointments. Launched in the state of Victoria 20 years ago, the shop has been in this location since 1988, with an interim stop near Kings Cross. I met with Brett Cohen as Tony was in Orange County, California, at a Western action six shooter event.
In spite of being surrounded by tattooing all of his life, Brett "avoided tattooing like the plague. I tried to stay away from it as much as I could but, in the end, it sucked me in and dragged me away." Tattooing for 12 years under Tony's watchful eye, he loves the people he meets. He's worked in San Francisco, Glasgow ("that was the highlight of my life") and Norway, but, for now, he's not setting foot on an airplane.
Brett's shop has "a wide spectrum of clients, from your every day minimum wage earner through to politicians and movie stars and rock stars. You name it, we tattoo 'em all. I think people like the fact that, if they want to get tattooed, they can ring up and say, 'Listen, I want to get tattooed some time this week' and, no problem, they can come in and get tattooed. They don't have to wait forever. And with the staff that we have, we're all competent tattooers, we can tattoo everybody when they come in. Currently, we have eight artists and one visiting from Italy. For the moment, everybody throughout the whole world is being very patriotic to their country. We're doing a lot of Southern Crosses and boxing kangaroos, which is an icon of Australia and its never-give-up sort of mentality, and that's a good thing."
According to Brett, "The tattoo scene in Sydney has changed a lot. The types of people that got tattooed used to be lower wage-earning people, people who were rebelling against something. The army and the navy were all getting tattooed. These days, you'll probably find half your police force is tattooed. If you go to the beach, you see it. Now women are getting tattooed and they're getting big, cool tattoos. People see tattooing on TV, in movies and on rock stars, and that starts to bring the perception of tattooing around. Now Italians and Greeks are getting tattooed too, whereas, not long ago, it wasn't part of their culture."
THE 'BURBS
Darlinghurst is Sydney's gay and lesbian
community and site of its annual Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras, held on the first Saturday in March. It is one of the largest such events in the world. Four tattoo shops compete for business here, the highest density of shops in
Sydney.
MISCHIEF MOON, 322 Bourke Street, Darlinghurst NSW. Phone: 9361 3332. Fax: 9260 1016. Open seven days from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.
Just steps from Oxford Street in the heart of Darlinghurst, this shop is co-owned by Vanessa Belanger a/k/a Mess, and Happy Niguidula. I met with Mess while Happy minded the store.
After her Dad bought her a tattoo kit for her 18th birthday, Mess tried to seek out an apprenticeship, but wasn't taken seriously. Because she was so young, she picked up the basics and taught herself. After working from home for two years, a friend asked her to design a tattoo and find an artist who would apply it. She took the design around to shops in Sydney, and found Happy who was looking for someone to fill a space in his shop. That was eight years ago. Today, Mess really loves doing pinup girls and '50s-style tattoos. "My favorite is doing color work." She also does portraits, after working many years to gain the confidence to do them. Happy's favorite is black-and-gray and he loves doing gray wash.
Commenting on their location, "I really treasure it. I'd rather work with the gay community than with your average straight yobbos (rednecks) that you get out in the suburbs. I don't think I'd relish the thought of just doing grim reapers and Harley Davidsons. The people around here show more imagination and initiative, when it comes to custom work."
As for the sterile chain of events, "Given where we work with the HIV and the hepatitis that's around, we take no shortcuts. Everybody gets treated equally and, because of that, there's very low risk. We're at more risk than the customer is."
The summer of 2000/2001 was their busiest ever and Mess feared burn-out. However, business has been very quiet since 9/11. "The tourist trade at Mardi Gras was down and there's nothing we can do about that. Another interesting trend is that, in the last six months, everybody's been paying with their cards. There's very little cash coming through. For years, the trend was roughly 50/50. Now it's taken a huge swing."
BILLY ARGHS CUSTOM TATTOOS AND BODY PIERCING, 143a Oxford Street, Darlinghurst NSW. Phone: 9360 0401.
Turned on to tattooing by the album covers of Rose Tattoo, the '70s Australian hard rock band whose members had full sleeves done by Tony Cohen, Billy learned the art in Sydney and then worked in San Diego and Cocoa Beach to get a first-hand look at the American scene. In this location for only one and a half years, he left a 15-year roster of clients behind when he moved from Blacktown, one hour west of Sydney. Business was slow the first six to 12 months, but being on one of the most famous streets in Sydney helped a lot. Favoring bright colors, he also sells flash under the Fat Billy brand name.
From where he sits, tattooing is not as accepted in Sydney as it is in other parts of the world. Still frowned upon, though not as much as ten to 15 years ago, "tattoos are the realm of a select group that's nowhere near as big as in the States." Billy can see more shops opening up here in ten to 15 years as "younger guys break away to go out on their own." Noting that, even today, many areas don't have a shop. Almost as an afterthought, Billy mentioned that he'd tattooed Elton John in March 2002, just three weeks after opening. A bodyguard came in to ask if he could tattoo a design he handed him. They agreed to a charge of $90, and, the next day, Sir Elton arrived with his entourage to get his first tattoo. "I said, "That'll be $90," and he give me $500. And that was the end of Elton. I haven't seen him since. I wasn't allowed to take any photos"
By the way, this shop is so squeaky clean you could eat off the steps.
HARRY'S TATTOO WORLD, TAYLORS SQUARE, Flinders Street, Darlinghurst NSW. Phone: 0331 5385.
When I stopped in, the man on duty asked me to return the next day to meet with the manager, Morgan. Unfortunately, my time ran out and I never got back there. Owned by the Rebels Motorcycle Club who, reportedly, run much of the east coast of Australia, the shop lacks the TLC obvious in owner-occupied shops.
STEEL LOTUS TATTOO, 174 Crown Street, Darlinghurst NSW 2010. Phone: (02) 9326 0555. Fax: (02) 9326 0999. steellotus@optusnet.com.au. Monday-Saturday, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
As owner Carly Hildred, working as a piercer at Pleasurable Piercings in Jersey City, New Jersey, traveled around the States to tattoo conventions, she fell in love with the tattoo community. Picking up her first machine in 1994, Carly did cosmetic tattooing in America, but didn't do body work until she came back to Australia. On returning, she worked as a piercer at the Illustrated Man for one and a half years, but opened her own place in 1997 to "avoid the groping."
The only female-owned shop in these parts is located on a leafy street very close to the Hard Rock Cafe and around the corner from Little Italy at Crown and Stanley Streets. Occupying what's known in Sydney as a terrace house, the spacious interior affords a large reception area managed by Carly's mother, a separate sterile room and, upstairs, large work areas for two tattooists and a piercer. Because of their location, they tend to have a lot of tourists as customers. Carly's art is influenced by the work of Horiyoshi III, and, having lived in Japan, she "understands that culture quite a lot." The other artist, Denny from Santiago, Chile, specializes in portraits. Carly sees the tattoo industry broadening and growing in a very healthy direction with a lot more artists "being more free and liberal with their work and stepping outside of the box and evolving to produce more unique individual work, as opposed to just copying someone else."
SEX, DRUGS AND SAILORS
King's Cross has a long history
of illegal gambling clubs, sex clubs, drug dealing, "shooting galleries," police corruption and murder. Nowadays, it attracts a bizarre mix of low life's, sailors, travelers, Japanese tourists, inner city trendies and
suburbanites all looking for a big night out. Just up from the Royal Australian Navy Base at Woolloomooloo, King's Cross used to be the most popular area for tattooing. Today, however, more sailors are based in Western
Australia and the Northern Territory than in Sydney. Recently in the news as the location of Russell Crowe's new $14 million matrimonial waterfront residence, the gentrification of Woolloomooloo is pushing the boundaries of
King's Cross. Only two tattoo shops remain there.
SLEEVEMASTERS TATTOO STUDIO, 2/44 Darlinghurst Road, Kings Cross 2011. www.sleevemasterstatoo.com. Open seven days and seven nights.
Since I'd had no reply to my e-mail to these guys, Cliffe, Lou and I stopped in late Saturday night to hook up with someone for an interview. The shop has no phone. Wednesday morning, I stopped in again and met Ken Adams. He allowed a photo but no interview becuase, "I'm not one for talkin'." Wednesday night, I went by again, and the place was closed at 10 p.m. Calling themselves "The Busiest Tattoo Shop in the World" strains credulity as there were no customers there each of three times I stopped in. Their Web site leads one to believe that Greg Ardon, infamous founder of Sleevelmasters works there. In fact, it's said he sold the place to bikers five years ago and hasn't been heard from since. The manager, Scott, was reported to be at the new shop in Newtown, but there is no phone there either. He acknowledged my e-mail four days after I left Australia.
MAX'S VILLAGE TATTOO STUDIO, 46 Lankelly Place, King's Cross, NSW 2011. Phone: (02) 9357 3223
Sharing the billing with Tony Cohen as the elder statesmen of the Sydney tattoo scene, Max Chater is the second generation in a three-generation tattoo family. His father, Alex, started tattooing in 1931 and was in the business 49 years, mostly in Sydney. People traveled to Sydney from all over Australia in his father's day. "There were two full-time studios and a couple of part-timers, while in the country area there was nobody. It was not uncommon for guys to have driven six, eight or ten hours to get tattooed."
As a boy, his major task was to run around Sydney and try to find needles. "There were no suppliers, so you had to go to the haberdashers, ladies sewing and knitting shops, and try to buy #12 sharps. If you made the mistake of saying, "I'm a tattooist," they wouldn't sell them to you. We used to tell them we sewed sequins onto ladies clothing. We found a supply where we could actually buy needles from a place in England in bulk. I still remember the address. It was Studleywarwickshire. They would sell needles in packs of 500, and that was amazing.
"With pigments, if you knew what to buy, you could get it. I think that's why the tattooists kept in such close contact with one another, because, if we found something, we would tell the others. In the '50s up to the '60s, there were maybe 100 tattooists worldwide. Pigments, we had yellow and orange that you could get here in Sydney, and we knew it was safe. Frank Thompson had a red supplier in Perth, and Dickie Reynolds in Melbourne had a guy that did blue and green. We would swap off.
"Billie Furness in Melbourne made excellent machines. We used to hand wind our own coils and have our frames made at the local foundry. From the military guys, we'd buy spent 303 bullets and drill them out to make the tip."
Before commercial flash, "you could easily tell where someone was from by their tattoo and who had done it. Sydney's style was more panthers and eagles. Melbourne was more ladies in bikinis and flowers. Perth was more the bluebirds and names. Judging by the choice of designs, Sydney was a more violent place."
Although his dad disapproved, Max has been tattooing for 44 years. "Traditionalism is making a comeback," he says. "Thank goodness. Tattoo art is an art form on its own. It's not wallpaper, it isn't paintings, it's not graffiti. A nice tattoo should be looked at from two yards and have that nice, distinct look." Max's favorite is large, traditional, Japanese-style work. His son, Zac, has been tattooing for ten years. "Gray wash is Zac's domain. He's excellent at it." Nicholas a/k/a Nick the Greek, Rocky and Mike Tyro, who has "worked for half the tattooists in America," complete the crew.
The shop has been in its present location for 23 years. Five years ago, Max doubled the size from 9'x12', but still shares the toilet with four other shops. Prior to the '70s, "we were all one-man shops and you could afford it. But now with costs, rents and equipment, I couldn't afford to run a one-man shop. The overhead just kills it."
THE ANSWER IS NEAR, BUT SOME SEEK IT FAR
Right next to the Central Business District is Surry Hills, where sunny, tree-lined streets are home
to Victorian terrace houses whose wrought-iron balconies are reminiscent of New Orleans.
INNER VISION TATTOO, 334 Crown Street, Surry Hills, 2010. Phone/fax: (02) 9361 4376. www.innervisiontattoo.com.au.
The Goodwill Ambassador of the Sydney tattoo scene, owner, Cliffe Clayton began his career in 1985 in Fortitude Valley, Queensland, at High Energy Tattoo. "It was a high volume street shop, and I was put straight to work, sink or swim, earn as you learn." A 1991 trip to the National Convention in Garden Grove, California, turned into a four-year odyssey of work in San Francisco, Reno and Vancouver, where Cliffe worked with the Dutchman for a year, learning a lot about basic drawing techniques and tattoo layout.
"There was a bit of a real small-town mentality about Australian tattooing and I was getting a bit frustrated with it," says Cliffe. "You'd compliment someone on their work and ask where they got their color, and they'd tell you they use food color from the local Woolworth's shop. There was a general lack of communication amongst tattooers, so I went to the States. There, information was more freely shared amongst people that were conscientious and trying to do some good work."
On returning, Cliffe spent a year in Brisbane, but it just didn't have that same old magic anymore. So he came to Sydney, where "people tend to be more up with the times." His shop, open for seven years, is run more along the lines of a custom American shop. "My real love in tattooing is Asian style. It's a timeless look, and there is a lot of positive symbolism. I just love anything with water, because you can really work a tattoo into the overall shape of the body and design a piece that will be enhanced by the body's movements."
Others in the shop are Nathan Puata, of Maori descent, who tattoos a lot of the islanders. "We had to give him one of the biggest work spaces, because his customers are so large." Trevor Bennett, an ex- artist for Mambo, a really hip young people's clothing and T-shirt design company, does "incredible black and gray work and beautiful portraiture work, photographic realism. I'm sure Brian Everett and Jack Rudy would tip their hat to our Trevor's work here." Megan Oliver loves pinup work and intricate work. Adam Craft, from New Zealand has worked throughout Europe and America and is "an incredible black tribal artist. We do a lot of cover-up and Adam is the cover-up king.
"We tattoo a lot of people from the arts and entertainment industries, plus a lot of very ordinary people. The people that get tattooed these days have really diversified. There was a stage where it was just military and bikers that got tattooed, but, these days, almost anybody could be tattooed. A lot of our business is return. We are known for being the guys that draw the work up for people. We have a consultation where we spend half an hour to get their mind into our mind, so to speak. Everyone in the shop has highly developed drawing skills. We'd never apprentice anyone, because it would just be impractical in a shop that is known for good work."
The shop is in an old converted terrace house and artists "all work in different rooms, so there's a privacy. Not everybody wants the whole world to be looking at them whilst they're getting a tattoo. From an upkeep point of view, there's a lot more work in it, because its like we're running five shops within a shop. We have a completely separate sterilizing room with a one-direction flow. The last thing people want to be worried about is health aspects. Doing the design right and the art is the main thing."
JOSH ROELINK, TATTOOIST, Sydney Australia. Appointment Only. Phone: 02 8308 8074 and 0425 288 074. www.tatudharma.com.
On his own for about a year, Josh previously worked at Inner Vision Tattoo for five years. His ten-year career started at Kiwi Kim's in Newtown, and, after stints in Melbourne and at Kaleidoscope in Bondi, he went to the States, working in Pasadena (Incognito Tattoo), San Francisco (Mom's Body Shop), Portland Oregon (Atlas Gallery) and Vancouver (Dutchman Tattoo). On a 1999 visit to Japan to be tattooed by Horiyoshi, Josh was struck by the peacefulness of the environment and the relaxed atmosphere. "I liked the whole idea of creating a shelter from the world," he told me.
His clients are referred by word-of-mouth and most have a general idea of what they want. "I work with them, so we're both happy with the result." Most are local, though he does have some interstate customers. "Occasionally, I get travelers from Canada and America that have heard about me or have found my Web site." His style tends towards larger Eastern work, Japanese, Tibetan and Thai, and he loves traditional Western stuff and likes mixing the two.
STRETCHING THE LIMITS
HOUSE OF PAIN, 53 Parramatta Road, Annandale NSW 2038. Phone: (02) 9557 4096. www.houseofpaintattoo.com.au and www.rosetattoo.com.au. Open noon to 6 p.m., Monday through Saturday.
Except for Manly and Bondi, I walked from shop to shop. Running a little late for my 4:30 appointment here, I decided to take a cab. Big Mistake! When the driver couldn't find #53, he dropped me off where he should not have, and I even tipped him! Turns out the numbers on Parramatta Road change every time it changes towns. Somehow this makes sense in Sydney, including the fact that odd and even numbers also switch from one side of the street to the other as the towns change. On the other hand, getting back to my hotel was an easy bus ride, because Parramatta Road conveniently changes names a couple of times to become the street where my hotel was!
Steve King, owner, and Peter Wells are members of the legendary Oz-Rock band, Rose Tattoo, playing bass and guitar, respectively, in the Pete Wells Band as well. Rose Tattoo has been together since 1976, when Pete founded the group. One of the conditions for membership was that each had to sport tattoos. Last year, the band went to Europe four times for six weeks each. Although"there have been ups and downs, they're still going strong. Joined by artist, Matthew Furner, our conversation covered the gamut.
On being tattooed: In the early '70s, Pete was told he had to hide his tattooed hands in a photo for a heavy metal album cover, although one guy was naked and the others were in their underwear. Touring in 1975 in Hawaii, security guards had one hand on their guns as band members walked through a mall. On tour with Aerosmith in 1983, managers thought they would need a makeup artist to paint tattoos on before each performance.
On the House of Pain: Steve opened the shop ten and a half years ago. Matt's been here eight years, and holds down the fort when Steve and Pete are away. He likes black and gray and religious work, tattooing local Portuguese and Italians who are referred to him by word of mouth. Pete's been there six years of his 20-year tattoo career, which includes time with Tony Cohen at Illustrated Man. He likes to do really traditional stuff.
Not surprisingly, they don't have many walk-ins. Clients are mostly regulars and people from Germany, France and Switzerland who e-mail them for an appointment. For the most part, their clients are conservative and they have to do all styles, as there's not enough population to specialize. Pete laments that, years ago, "designs were much more distinctive when people drew their own flash. You could tell which artist did the piece. Regional styles were distinctive, because there weren't too many guys tattooing."
HEY LOOK! THERE'S ELEPHANTS IN THE LIVING ROOM!
There are two elephants in the living room of the Sydney tattoo scene, namely, bikers and the
PTAA (Professional Tattooing Association of Australia). The two are connected because there are bikers in the PTAA though, of course, not all PTAA-member bikers are bikers in the outlaw sense. Many artists fear the former and
ignore the latter, and most spoke out only on condition of anonymity.
The PTAA was founded 19 years ago with the intention of maintaining the ethics of the industry and helping develop health department guidelines for tattooing. The rules state that membership, open only to artists with three year's experience working in a shop, is by nomination by an existing member and is provisional for 12 months during which time the nominee may not vote or judge at tattoo shows and is under scrutiny by other members for behavior that is not "derogatory to the tattoo industry." Members can be voted out if there are complaints from customers and/or the health department. There are 320 individual members.
Members voted to not send photos of their work to magazines that have supplier ads and there is a list of taboo magazines. Incidentally, Skin & Ink is on the list, even though it stopped taking supplier ads six years ago.
DEMOCRACY: A FREE MARKETPLACE OF IDEAS?
On the
convention scene, people in the States who complain about too many conventions, listen up. In Australia, a country the size of the USA, there is one annual three-day PTAA National Tattoo Convention, plus each state's
group holds its own one-day show.
Only PTAA members can enter contests. Describing last year's convention as "boring," one artist summed up the PTAA like this: "There is nothing to be gained except you can enter your work at their tattoo shows. You don't have to achieve any great heights and membership doesn't stand for having a clean shop or high standards." One who did go on record is Luciano Lima. "I would like to see more tattoo conventions in Sydney with people gathering together. I'd like to see the industry more open. More competition means better artists. As with any other business, people should be able to do and say whatever they want."
BIKER THREATS CAST SHADOWS
Breaking its own rules, the
PTAA has allegedly conferred membership to non-artist representatives of powerful motorcycle clubs that are trying to take control of the industry. Reports are that bikers got into the business five years ago to use as a front
for laundering money from drug sales, buying Sleevemasters and taking over Kiwi Kim's in the process. "Kiwi Kim met a tragic end. She was a very good tattooer when bikers came along and started giving her free drugs. Over the
years, the amount she owed accumulated and they ended up taking her shop away. It's really sad. She lost custody of her son and, after six months, the shop shut down. It's an ugly scene."
Nor is the supplier side of the business immune. "The Micky Sharpz rep is a Bandito. Locally, we can't buy supplies except thru biker clubs. They control distribution."
Not surprisingly, opinion varies about the effect the biker presence has on the tattoo scene. From "There's no room for more shops. Why should any kid be able to open a shop on a whim?" to "The problem in Australia is that there is a lot of holdback from the bikers. They kind of control the tattoo industry. They make it harder for people who want to open a business. They suppress it."
Suppression takes several forms, including the aforementioned to "You better move out of my territory." In actuality, much of it seems to be psychological. One artist told me, "We've never been harassed by the bikers here. We've never been stood over for protection money, but there is anxiety about it."
NO WORRIES, MATE!
Looking at the big picture, what has not been suppressed is the art. Creativity and world-class work is alive and well in
Sydney. Choice, for the consumer, is there, as is value. For people from abroad especially, the exchange rate makes top-notch work done in Sydney very affordable by comparison to America. Also, the changing face of today's
customers bodes well for innovators. Says one, "The real rough studios with guys who can't string a sentence together without saying "fuck" 15 times are still around, but the average person isn't going to go to them. A lot of
the shops complain there isn't enough work, but it's because they haven't changed with the times."
CAPTIONS:
1. Sydney's busy harbor.
8. Manly's Corso, with its Victorian era facades, links Manly Cove with the ocean beach.
14.
Kaleidoscope Krew, from left to right: Claudio Benvenuti, Naomi Beinart (receptionist), Luciano Lima, Danny Kelly (piercer), Panupong Wongphan a/k/a Tong. Missing: Fabio Lima and Sam.
16. Mischief Moon's Mess and Happy.
19. Illustrated Men (left to right): Brett Cohen, Elliott Gillam, Zack Tait, Gary Southcombe, Les Jnr.
22. The Maltese Australian, work by Brett Cohen.
25. Les' backpiece by Tony Cohen.
27. Ken Adams, the day man.
29. Max and Nick in the Village.
33. Steve, Matt and Pete.
36. Inner Vision Tattoo (left to right). Rear: Nathan Puata, Phill Roberts (assistant), Cliffe Clayton, Adam Craft. Front: Louise Camroux (assistant), Megan
Oliver. Missing: Trevor Bennett.
41. Billy Argh.
42. Josh Groelink.