Once regarded as the mark of a rebel, tattoos find their way into the mainstream

Getting a tattoo isn’t just for drunken sailors anymore, or drunken college students, for that matter. In fact, you can’t even get a tattoo in Missouri if you’re under the influence of alcohol or drugs.

Nor are tattoos the exclusive domain of goths, biker chicks or other assorted rebels.

“It’s not just students who get tattoos,” said Tim Milligan of Alternative Art Ink on Walnut Street, who has been tattooing people since 1995. “I’ve tattooed doctors, lawyers, teachers, counselors. I’ve even tattooed a preacher.”

But if you’re one of the 16 percent of Americans with a tattoo, a number derived from a 2003 Harris Interactive Poll, you already know that.

And tattoo parlors are not even called tattoo parlors anymore. The correct term is “studio” or “salon.”

And in Columbia, the luxury level of tattoo establishments got kicked up a notch with the opening of Living Canvas Studio of Tattoo & Art Gallery on July 29.

Housed in a former attorney’s office, complete with fireplaces, snazzy green couches and tasteful décor, Living Canvas on Broadway has space to bring on board a reiki massage master and an acupuncturist.

“It’s the next evolution of tattooing,” said Dean Jones, owner of the establishment, which now offers tattooing and body piercing. Gone is the guy with a cigarette in the corner of his mouth, dropping ashes on you as he works, Jones said.

Today, tattoo establishments are sanitary places with autoclaves to sterilize the equipment and fresh individually packaged needles. Tattoo artists work in rubber gloves and use wide swathes of protective tape.

In keeping with the idea of tattoos as art, Living Canvas includes an art gallery to display the work of local artists. Letters have been sent to college and university art professors and departments seeking submissions for display.

Tattooing still faces some struggles. The state only began licensing tattoo establishments and tattooists in 2003. And this licensing does not include any oversight or requirements about skill or training, something Vanessa Beauchamp, executive director of Missouri’s Department of Economic Development Office of Tattooing, Body Piercing and Branding, said she and many tattooists would like to see changed.

Scotty Lammers of Tattoo You on Range Line Street agrees. “I think the state should have more information than they do,” he said, noting that a poorly done tattoo may not stand the test of time.

Pop stars spread tattoo fever

Columbia’s tattoo artists point to television and music to explain the increase in the popularity of tattoos.

As Mikey Wheeler of Hollywood Rebels on 10th Streeet put it, if you see all your heroes such as rock stars, actors and even NBA basketball players “all sleeved out” (tattoos completely covering their arms), you’re more likely to want a tattoo.

And he’s right. There are two television shows that highlight tattooing and a long list of A-list celebrities who have tattoos. A 2005 list on tattoos.com includes Angelina Jolie, Nicole Richie, Britney Spears, Eminem, Pamela Anderson, Tommy Lee, Brad Pitt and Paris Hilton.

It’s also a growing industry. The Web site vanishingtattoo.com notes that tattooing is one of the fastest-growing ventures, ranking along with computers and cell phone service.

The growth in Missouri is hard to track because state licensing is so new. But the number of tattooists has increased from 406 in 2003 to the most recent tally of 542.

In Columbia, Wheeler said business at Hollywood Rebels has increased $50,000 from last year and he expects the trend to continue. With three years’ experience as a tattoo artist, he said at one time business would slump during the summer and winter. No more.

During the second week of August, he said, “It’s been totally insane for the last two to three weeks.”

Other Columbia tattoo artists reported the increases in business as well.

But does it hurt?

Getting a tattoo feels like a bad sunburn combined with a cat clawing.

That’s how Brad Boer described it as he received his third tattoo. In the chair with tattoo artist Pete Tieman at work, Boer gave a simple explanation as to why he wanted another tattoo: “I like the way it looks.”

Boer, a martial arts student and Columbia Mall food service worker, is a sign of the times. The Harris Poll reports that more than one-third of Americans 25-29 years old have tattoos.

And more and more of those with tattoos are ordinary people with reasons ranging from marking an occasion to simply liking the look.

“It stings,” recalled Trudy Buckman, an accountant at one of Columbia’s hospitals. She got her tattoo four years ago to mark her 41st birthday. “To me, it was like a declaration of independence, that I was going to make my own decisions. I did it because I wanted to do it, and I didn’t care what other people thought about it.”

Buckman said she went with a friend to get a tattoo and realized that it wasn’t something “only biker chicks did” and the establishment wasn’t a hole in the wall. Buckman received her tattoo at Tattoo You and said, “Respectable people were there.”

Dealing with regret

Although neither Boer nor Buckman regrets the decision, the Harris Poll shows that about 17 percent of people with tattoos do. The most common reason for that regret is a person’s name in the tattoo.

All of Columbia’s tattoo establishments and tattoo artists interviewed said they discourage people from getting a name tattooed except in the case of memorial tattoos. Some artists even refuse to tattoo a name.

“I’ve covered up so many,” said Adya Crawford, manager of Living Canvas. Some people even see her as a specialist in covering up unwanted tattoos.

Tim Walton of Tattoo You, a professional tattooist since 1993, offers a particularly nasty tale of why people should avoid getting a tattoo with a name, even if they’re married.

He recalls one customer who came in for a tattoo to mark his 20th wedding anniversary. The man returned the next day, asking to have it removed, after having found his soon-to-be-ex-wife in a moment of indiscretion. Walton had to tell him he’d have to wait until it healed in order to have it covered up with something new.

Only 2 percent of those who regretted their decision blamed the tattoo for affecting a job search. At Living Canvas, the tattoo artists refuse to tattoo anyone above the collarbone or on the hands.

Wheeler of Hollywood Rebels puts it succinctly: “If you get a tattoo on your face or hands, you’d better be a musician or a tattoo artist.” A tattoo, he noted, is not like a favorite band or a new pair of shoes. “You don’t get one (a tattoo) and give it back,” Wheeler said.

Why we ink the skin

Although tales of misguided loyalty abound, there are other reasons for getting a tattoo. Memorial tattoos, to mark the passing of a loved one are common. The picture of a baby can keep a beloved memory close.

And sometimes a tattoo can turn a tragedy into a victory.

Wheeler of Hollywood Rebels tells about a woman who was confined to a wheelchair and wanted a tattoo. She was injured while cleaning when she knocked a box off a shelf in the closet, discharging and the gun it contained. The gun shot her through the neck, leaving her paralyzed from the neck down.

“It was horrible,” said Wheeler, describing the accident. “But the woman wasn’t beaten: She had “crippled chicks rock” emblazoned on her arm. “It was pretty inspiring,” he said.

The art of the tattoo

The rise in the popularity of tattoos sometimes results in what Jon Bush of Dream Catcher describes as the “bread and butterflies” of his job. As he puts it, everyone thinks they need a tattoo and many want a design like their friends have — a butterfly. These tattoos contribute to the income of the tattoo artists but not to their sense of artistic achievement.

The trend also flies in the face of some of the origins of tattooing, which in many cultures began as ceremonial, spiritual or religious art.

According to Tattoo History: A Source Book by Steve Gilbert, tattooed specimens have been found all over the world. One of the best preserved is a mummy, Amunet, which was found in Egypt and dates from 2160-1994 B.C. The tattoos included parallel lines on her arms and thighs and elliptical patterns below her navel. The designs are thought to have some kind of fertility and religious meaning, Gilbert writes.

But along the way, these deep religious origins were lost.

The Greeks and Romans disdained tattoos, equating them with barbarians. After learning the technique from the Persians, they used tattoos to mark slaves and criminals.

To stop the disfigurement, Pope Hadrian forbade any kind of tattooing in 787 A.D. “It is for this reason that tattooing was virtually unknown in the Christian world until the 19th century,” Gilbert writes.

It was not until after 1769, when Captain Cook visited Polynesia that tattooing came back into Western culture. In Polynesia, tattooing was associated with spirituality and beauty.

Polynesia may also be where the word tattoo entered the Western world. The Polynesian word, ta, means knocking or striking. In Polynesia, tattoos are applied with a hammer-like tool, dipped in lamp black and then struck or knocked on the skin, piercing it to insert the lamp black, according to Body Piercing and Tattoos, a book edited by J.D. Lloyd. Other scholars say the word is derived from the sound of the hammer knocking.

However, when seagoing men brought back the idea of tattooing, it became associated with paganism and native culture and was once again suppressed, writes Gilbert.

Although sailors might have re-introduced the art of tattoo to Western culture, today it is no longer confined to seagoing folks.