The O-town Scene - Oneonta, NY
Issue link: https://www.ifoldsflip.com/i/23074
Indelible Ink artists, from left, Dan Scannell and Austin Voltura, get wild in the shop’s reception area. Golden Lotus Thick black line tattoos wrap around Taylor Jack- son’s neck and shaved head onto his cheeks, giving him a permanent beard of inked designs. The rest of his body, too, is covered with black tribal-style tattoos that Jackson designed, but people notice the tattoos on his face first. Although Jackson may look intimidating, the sought-after tattoo artist is actually mild-mannered and amiable. The 27-year-old has been tattooing people at Golden Lotus Tattoo at 75½ Main St. in Oneonta since he moved to the area from Mobile, Ala., in 2004. “People like coming here because we don’t have — what do they call it? — ‘tattitude,’” he says with a smile, looking up from the stylized lilies and vines he’s tattooing on the ribs of Jasmine Purdy, a 22-year-old student at SUNY Cortland. Rib tattoos, designs on the side of the midsection, are popular right now, especially for girls. And what of tramp stamps The Golden Lotus team takes a break between appointments. From left: Taylor Jackson, Travis Jackson, James McIlroy and Nathan Purcell. 16 O-Town Scene Jan. 13, 2011 — those lower back tattoos that women were crazy about a few years ago? Pretty much obsolete. “Once they started calling it a ‘tramp stamp,’ nobody wanted it anymore,” Jackson says, add- ing. “Barbed wire is pretty much gone, too — thank God.” Story by Cassandra Miller Photos by Genevieve Pedulla What’s in style are modernized “Sailor Jerry” tattoos inspired by original Americana designs — such as sparrows, scroll banners and dice — recently popularized by the Ed Hardy brand. The man for which the company’s named was a protege of “Sailor Jerry,” Norman Keith Collins, a prominent mid-20th century American tattoo artist. The written word is another popular choice. “The Megan Fox thing — that shit’s going crazy,” Jackson says, referring to the bombshell actress who has famously been photographed exposing the paragraphs of text on her ribs and shoulder. “Sayings are catching on. We’re doing a lot more script these days.” Jackson prefers realism and neotraditionalism (a name that’s used to describe modernized “Sailor Jerry”-style tattoos), because the designs can work with the contours of the body better than a block of solid text, which he says “completely works against the flow of the body.” The flow of the body is just one aspect art- ists take into account when consulting a client. Placement, size, details and line thickness are also considered, according to James McIlroy, 26, who has been apprenticing at Golden Lotus for about eight months. McIlroy is in the midst of intense studying and practicing of tattoo techniques. McIlroy and Nathan Purcell, 21, another ap- prentice, are mild-mannered, friendly and profes- sional like their colleague, Jackson. The two ap- prentices look like they’ve been transplanted from Brooklyn — shaggy hair, mustaches, plaid, flannel shirts — but without any hipster pretension.