If you happen to be located in St., Windsor, Colorado on 6/23/09 at 6pm check out your local library and you can “Learn about the art of tattooing from Mr. Bill, a certified tattoo artist from Windsor’s own B&N Tattoo Studio. Mr. Bill will discuss history, technique, and provide a henna demonstration!” Apparently B&N Tattoo Studio is the first tattoo in St. Windsor, if you’d like to check out some of Mr. Bill’s work here is tattoo portfolio. Sounds like Mr. Bill is trying to make good with the community and highly doubt there will be much technique taught, just a fun little meeting for people to gain more awareness about tattooing… if someone is close to Colorado we’d love to hear how the event went. Apparently the library has just been updated and is a big hit in town

The tattoo parlor, at 10028 82 Ave., was closed June 5 for infringing on several health regulations, including reusing instruments that had not been properly sanitized, not cleaning surfaces thoroughly and tattooing animals in the studio.

Dr. Gerry Predy, senior medical officer of health for the province, said he didn’t know the level of risk to the shop’s clients. People are urged to call Health Link Alberta at 780-408-5465, and get tested.

As a customer of a shop it’s important to check out whether or not a shop has the appropriate spore tests done, however with the explosion in tattoo popularity many people don’t know the dangers of improper tattooing.  It shouldn’t get to the point where people have to worry about diseases they are getting from their new tattoo, an artist needs to create a professional environment where there customers can feel safe and it’s also important for the customer’s to be aware of what defines a safe tattooing environment.  Strories like this hurt the industry as a whole…. [News]

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We are starting a new music tattoo pictures section on the site feel free to link to your favorite tattoo pictures in the section this page is dedicated to music tattoos.

Know a great tattoo artist who is good at celebrity portrait tattoo pictures and designs? Leave a link to there celebrity tattoos in the comments and we’ll add them to Tattoo Blog!

This past week, though it only leaked out in quiet news reports here and there, the acceptance of tattoos in the work environment took a big leap forward.  It may have taken five years, but 35-year-old Nadine Bélisle of Quebec, Canada has struck a blow for everyone who’s ever been told to cover up a tattoo at work.

Bélisle is employed as a daycare worker, but she also has a tattoo of a dragon on the back of her right shoulder blade.  When she came to work with the tattoo exposed, her employers told her that it would have to be covered up.

Well, that sounded like a whole bunch of nonsense to Nadine and she filed a lawsuit with the backing of her union which claimed that being forced to cover up a tattoo is a violation of rights.  The entire thing went to court and finally, this past May 27th, Quebec Judge Jean Bouchard decided that:

“Tattooing nowadays is a phenomenon that cuts across all levels of society.  If it was once associated with delinquents, that’s no longer the case.”

Nadine is now permitted to have her tattoo visible for all to see at her place of work.  Wow.  This is such a great thing.  Speaking as someone who has had to cover up tattoos in the past, I am absolutely delighted to see that legal courts are actually beginning to take a sensible stance on tattoos and the work place.  We all know that a tattoo is not an indicator of how hard you’re willing to work or how capable of a worker that you are.  This ruling is going to go a long way in helping to establish that fact amongst the public.

Nice one Nadine!  Nice one Judge Jean Bouchard!

It appears that Quebec is really in the tattoo spotlight this week.  This time it’s all about Sylvie Ménard of Montreal, Quebec, Canada, who had a rather unpleasant experience while returning from a vacation in Mexico this past April.  Why this story is just hitting the news now, is beyond me.

At any rate, Ménard was stopped by airport authorities upon her attempted re-entry into Canada.  Her name and birthdate matched that of a wanted criminal (what a crappy coincidence) and so, despite her numerous forms of ID, Ménard was handcuffed and escorted into one of those holding cells that can be found somewhere deep in the bowels of every international airport.  A female border official then asked a fully disturbed and frightened Ménard to strip naked, so that her ass could be inspected.  

Okay, maybe it wasn’t said in quite those same words, but the border official really did want to see Ménard’s buttocks.  The purpose?  The criminal they were looking for had a pink tattoo on her buttocks and the airport officials wanted to see if Ménard also had it.  Well, Ménard complied and of course there was no tattoo.  But that wasn’t good enough for Canada’s crack force border guards.  Some time later it occured to them that perhaps the criminal they were looking for had the tattoo lasered off, and so they asked Ménard to disrobe again, in order for them to check and see if there was evidence of scar tissue.  Was it there?  Nope.  Ménard was later released and told by airport authorities that she should consider changing her name in order to avoid this type of confusion again in the future.

Aiport border officers in Canada are typically bad  – Vancouver International Airport being the worst – but come on!  Surely it can’t be that hard to keep things straight.  Okay, so maybe this one time there was a mix up and they had to hold her for a little while.  But how hard is it to put some note or something on her file that reads “This woman is not the one with the ass tattoo.  Leave her alone.”?  I just did that and it took me less than ten seconds.  Can I have a job as a border guard now?

As tattoo enthusiasts we all know that tattoos are attention getting. That is one of the great things about tattoos, whether someone loves them or hates them doesn’t matter one bit. They still look. Tattoos speak your mind to the world around you.

So what does this say about Cincinnati Bengals receiver Chad Ochocinco’s latest bid for attention by faking out anyone who would pay attention to him with a few fake facial tattoos? Not a whole hell of a lot, I’m afraid.

A couple of days ago Chad sought to set the NFL ablaze with talk about him by swearing that he was getting his face tattooed on his Twitter blog. “Yall might not believe me but my tatoo guy is here and i getting my face done, looks cool to, dont be mad just accept the Ocho please” (Sic). Even going as far as to post the pictures of three obviously fake tattoos on the blog.

After several Bengals fans noted that the tattoos were obviously fakes, he posted the next day that it was all a big joke and that his grandmother would kill him if he got tattoos on his face. To me this sounds more like a lame attempt to save what little there is of his fan base after getting busted.

“Hey, guys! It was just a joke!” Yeah, right. Talk about lame.

While we may get use to posers who put on tempttoos in their sad attempt to show how cool they are, this has to rate as the all time low in a bid for attention by an obvious attention whore. Ochocinco could give lessons to Paris Hilton. What’s next, Ocho? An “accidental” flash of your junk with a henna tattoo as you get out of your car?

Give me a fucking break!

Look, if you want to get celebrity attention why not stick to playing football? Better yet, why not take the advice of your fans and start actually playing football instead of thinking up lame publicity stunts to get your name back in the headlines? Oh, and leave the temporary tattoos to the kiddies……at least they are more mature about it.

The ban on visible tattoos by a daycare center in Quebec Canada recently took a major hit. It seems that Superior Court judge Jean Bouchard struck down the ruling, originally upheld by a labor arbitrator as within the daycare’s rights. According to Judge Bouchard the ban on visible tattoos “rests on prejudices.”

The furor began when Nadine Belisle, who has a tattoo of a dragon snaking down the back of her right shoulder blade, was asked by her employer CPE La Pirouette, one of Quebec’s publicly funded daycares, demanded that she cover the tattoo. Ms. Belisle and her union challenged the ban as a violation of her civil rights.

Now when things like this happen it is almost a knee jerk reaction to believe that things were settled quickly. Not so. The fight began almost five years ago and ended with the judge’s ruling. Ms. Belisle said that she was thrilled to put the five year conflict behind her. Still she felt that the entire thing was a question of human rights and freedom of expression.

Considering the current trend by employers all over to crack down on visible tattoos perhaps they should take a look at this case. While it won’t have much impact on employers elsewhere, at least it will hold some water in the Great White North.

Now, while I can see banning some tattoos from sight when one has a job that deals with the general public, or children. Some collectors do get carried away, and I really wouldn’t have wanted my children seeing naked girls riding giant penises when they were four year olds. Still I see no reason why images of flowers, dragons, tribal, etc, etc, should have to be hidden from view on the job.

Hell, even the kids show up with temporary tattoos plastered all over themselves. I remember the food coloring tattoos that use to come in bubblegum when I was a tyke. Smeared like crap when you tried to put them on, but damn they were cool! Those tempttoos did more to influence me than the several heavily tattooed bikers and service men that I grew up around did.

While Ms. Belisle and her union are quick to point out that they are not asking for carte blanc when it comes to visible tattoos, they also see no reason for tasteful body art to have to be hidden like a pornographic magazine.

“We’re professionals and want to give a good example to the children. We agree that if a tattoo is sexist, racist or violent it should be camouflaged,” said union president Sylvie Blackburn. “But I don’t see how children are going to be traumatized by a flower on someone’s ankle.”

Neither do I, Sylvie.

The La Pirouette daycare may appeal the ruling.

My friend is a tattooist and occasionally likes to do a “humourous” tattoo, this was mine 🙂 and it was very painful I must admit, but well worth the laughs!