Vintage tattoo parlor, and gallery that houses the spin-off of L.A Ink’s reality television show,Wooster St. Social Club held its grand its opening Wednesday. Echoing what began in L.A, and then later migrated to Miami, the Soho space is an art + body academy, where models meet drawers. Photography encapsulates this juncture, as magazine articles and Scott Lipps’ 2002 inception of the One Management’s ‘hybrid’ brings together a platform blend of fashion, music, film, art and celebrity-sponsorship.
Some would say tattoo is beautiful. That it represents a poetical rendering of Art + Body. Ms. Kat Von D has articulated so much in L.A, Miami, and now does so in New York. Her bestseller, “High Voltage Tatoo,” with forewords by Motley Crue’s Nikki Sixx, showcases her artwork and tattooing. She released a makeup line, for Sephora, which legitimizes her creativity, in the fashion world—and invites models, designers and editors to partake in her artistically diverse, tattoo- realm.
How and where the idea of tattoo iconography manifests itself is up to us writers, models and actors. Chris Stain’s spray paints on archival paper masterpieces, demonstrate this tension between the cartoon and the real, and the model or the actor. Do we privilege the plastic, the commercial or the real and historical?
