The artists brought together in this exhibition are, before being tattoo artists, draftsmen; they sketch, outline, shade, and color tirelessly. Their images, despite moving from paper to skin, connect us with a boundless graphic universe, coming from diverse origins, places, and intentions.
The artists brought together in this exhibition are, before being tattoo artists, draftsmen; they sketch, outline, shade, and color tirelessly. Their images, despite moving from paper to skin, connect us with a boundless graphic universe, coming from diverse origins, places, and intentions.
Their influences, techniques, and pursuits are varied, but they are united by their expressive and communicative drive. In this way, their artistic practice and processes assert the creation and reinterpretation of images that are popular, personal, and even iconic, bringing them into new spaces while endowing them with new senses and meanings.
In this context, drawing a line is not a merely technical or graphic act; within it we can find countless pieces of evidence about the person marking it — millimeter by millimeter their personality and character are revealed, unveiling a multitude of intentions and meanings beyond the formal. In this process, each image bears witness to the life and expectations of the one who draws it.
Just like drawing, tattooing has developed across diverse schools, styles, and techniques; there are closely guarded secrets that have been passed down from master to apprentice, continuing across generations. Tattoo practitioners defend the complexity of their work and present design on skin as yet another displacement from two-dimensional surfaces, proposing the body as a traveling gallery.
Transgression, rebellion, autonomy, and the search for identity are concepts that relate not only to the world of tattooing but to artistic expression in general; however, because tattooing is so closely tied to the body, it has been stigmatized in certain contexts. Its acceptance has, in one way or another, been historically vindicated for its important role in sociocultural and identity-based construction.
We thank the artists for their participation and for allowing us into their workspaces — places that are without doubt wonderful and full of charm, and that, for anyone interested in images, are quite an experience to visit.
Santiago Rodríguez Ortiz - Curatorship and Collections, MAC