i started the first draft of my right sleeve two days ago! it will be a work in progress for a while but its definitely in the works!!! i have had a few ideas floating around in my head for quite some time and i got suddenly inspired to start sketching.
the thing i'm kinda struggling with is that my whole reasoning for getting this tattoo is to honour my mum (i'm adopted), and although she has tattoos herself, she hates the idea of me getting a sleeve done. we discussed it over christmas dinner and she flipped out at the fact that it can't easily be covered if needed. i work in a creative industry (i'm a hair and makeup artist) and have never had any need to cover my tattoos because its extremely accepted in my field. i can't ever see myself working in a conservative job where my ink is not going to be accepted. it frustrates me that she can't look past that and see how much some of her favourite thngs have become my favouite things, how her values have become my values and how much i want to show everyone what she means to me.
anyways... some backstory...be prepared... its a bit long winded... err, sorry about that
SPOILERS! (Click to view)
i am the youngest of 4 girls. the only adopted child. i've known since i was about 9 years old. regardless of this, i was always treated the same as my sisters and had a very stable upbringing, which i am very grateful for. i consider my mother to be a very strong woman, and she brought us girls up to also be strong women. to speak our minds and stand up for what we believe in.
one thing i remember from my childhood is watching sunday matinee movies on tv wth my mum. it was our thing. we did this every week. i remember thinking about how glamorous the women in these movies were... how their hair was always styled, how their makeup was always perfect. how their gloves/shoes/bag matched their dresses, etc. looking back i think about how these women were playing strong roles most of the time. i guess this was the beginning of my love of the women of the 40's and 50's. so its safe to say that i was always going to get a pinup style tattoo somewhere on my body.
as far back as i can remember, i have always been able to rollerskate. i can't remember NOT being able to skate. mum used to take us almost every weekend to the El Toro Roller Skating Rink at Long Jetty in New South Wales, near where i grew up. she loved skating and taught us almost as soon as we could walk, i think, but after she had a pretty bad skating accident where she was pushed over and broke her tailbone, those weekend skating expeditions stopped.
my first pair of quad skates were a pair that strapped onto my shoes... they were adjustable, to grow with my feet. when i got older, i wore white boot skates. then onto black and green boots... and then inline skates. i had a really bad skating accident and broke my wrist in 3 places when i was about 12 or 13 years old. needless to say my mum freaked out and hid my inline skates. i didn't skate again until i was about 17 years old... i bought another pair of inline skates and talked a bunch of my friends into skateing with me at the rink a block away from my house (Skate Arena, Red Hill). by this stage i was in the final year of my hairdressing apprenticeship and work was kinda taking over. my free time was spent preparing for hair competitions, and not skating.
fast forward to last year(almost 11 years later). i was catching up with my good friend clay, an artist who at that stage was preparing his first major gallery exhibition of his popart paintings of roller derby girls and 50's style diner roller girls. we got to talking about quirky things we shared. clay and i share our birthdate, just 10 years apart, and our love of skating...me rollerskating and him skateboarding... and then he asked me if i'd skate for him on the opening night of his exhibition. the deal was that he'd buy me a new pair of skates if i'd skate around the gallery for a few hours on opening night. i agreed and we went shopping! my skates are balck with green wheels and now have matching black and green checked laces... how very me! so this was the rebirth of my love of skating... mum got all excited about me skating for clay, though i still haven't managed to get her to a rink yet.
the connection... well my pinup girl will be wearing skates... i have some work to do and then i'll have my tattoo artist refine it, but she will be glamorous AND strong.
these two elements have been with me forever! they remind me so much of my mum and of the times we spent together...how she shared with me things that she loved and how much i have loved those same things.
nature v nurture. its both i think. you are born with some things but you are given others. both matter because both shape us into the beings we become over the ages. i hope i can one day share this blog with her so she can see just how she has helped to shape me.
wow this turned out a whole lot longer than i had planned... hope i didn't bore you too much!
zn.xx
You guys are doing Soundwave yes?? I hope so, would love to see yaz xo
Don't forget to post pics when you have something drawn up I wanna see it!