author gets Latin epigraph tattooed on forearm

[polliwog]

...hasn't fully thought through the consequences of having words on a very visible part of her body beforehand: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/13/opinion/sunday/mark-my-words-maybe.html

Maybe someone should start a thread dedicated to questionable tattoo-related articles? I wanted to share this but it seems unnecessary to have a thread for each new article...there are so many of them...

[MadeIndelible]

I could only get through two paragraphs of that article. Definite douche chills.

[motsimus]

Yeah I read the whole thing and still didn't get what she was babbling on about.

[kingofcosta]

It's her fault for continually translating the Latin for whoever enquires. She could just say it meant that she liked sunny days or something equally innocuous and avoid all the philosophical bullshit that follows the real meaning.

Pretentious idiocy.

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[KegRN]

All this text drives me crazy!. I like to look at tattoo's on pinterest but I have found myself having to narrow my search to back piece or sleeve to avoid pages and pages of text tattoo's. How boring! Why do people do that? Isn't this supposed to be art? Am I going to start walking through art galleries and see framed text? Wait, people are doing this in their homes now...

[Diehardonvhs]

I call entire bullshit on the deep philosophical conversation with the clerk. Entirely made-up scenario to suit a very badly written narrative. What a load of arse.

[SeeSea]

Looks like she spent more time generating the pseudo-psychology justification than she did thinking about the actual tattoo. If asked she should just repeat this phrase from her article. That should scare off any further questions! @.@

The script is full of vectors pointing in opposite directions, a statement both aspirational and self-scolding, a desire to be seen and a desire to be left alone; a desire to have my body admired and a desire for my body to need nothing but itself, to need no affirmation from anyone.

[tatB]

clearly we aren't the target audience.

[SeeSea]

All this text drives me crazy!.

Facebook has gotten really annoying - filling my feed with inspirational quotes that just HAVE to be rendered as a picture. I think that's because the poster is less interested feeling/enjoying in the actual quote and more interested in having the world think *they* are somehow an embodiment of the quote. I dunno - some are nice but it's just too much.

- - - Updated - - -

A well-written article and a fun read: The Letter of the Law: Laws for Lettering and Tattoos

Many great sections including:

• Text Tattoos Fight Anatomy
  
• Text Tattoos Fight Good Tattooing
  
• Text Tattoos Eat Up A Lot Of Skin
  
• Text Tattoos Cock Block Other Tattoos
  

And a preview for your reading pleasure:

• TEXT TATTOOS DESTROY THE ART OF TYPOGRAPHY: Just like every other art form, typography has its own rules & limitations. Before computers loaded with hundreds of fonts downloaded for free, typography was a specialized profession, & typographers were very proud crafters of type. Good type is readable because of weight, form, size, leading, tracking, & kerning. Its designed to be read on flat surfaces, with maximum contrast between very dark lettering & very light grounds.

You, dear tattoo client, are not flat white paper. You're a series of interlocking muscle bands, & you're covered with skin that is anything but white. You are cylindrical, almost every part of you body is long & rounded. But its not rounded evenly, like a pole, each surface is tapered, being much wider at some points & narrower at others. You're also topographical, with some points rising & dipping dramatically. On top of all that, you're also flexible, so unless you've been stuffed by an expert taxidermist, the minute you move, you will morph into even more elastic contorted shapes. When you try to apply text to this living organic medium, the lines waver, the letter size changes, the spacing inside the letter closes up, the spacing between the letters & between the words run together. It looks like crap. And Guttenberg spins in his grave.

This is why no one has invented billboards for telephone poles or railings, because no one could read it.

[irezumi]

Isn't this supposed to be art? Am I going to start walking through art galleries and see framed text?

Actually, yes. And I own some that I bought or traded other artists for. And I've made some myself. To assume your judgement of 'what art is' is the gospel is pretentious at best.

[Mark Bee]

I have some text-based art. I have a couple of pieces that chart the fonts of our local transit system over the last 60 years. I love that kind of graphical representation.

[CultExciter]

I just love how she used the Zapfino typeface instead of actually having someone draw something for her.

[Pugilist]

I call entire bullshit on the deep philosophical conversation with the clerk. Entirely made-up scenario to suit a very badly written narrative. What a load of arse.

That's all I could think while I was reading this too!

[HaydenRose]

When I got to the end of the article and it defined it as an essay in a series... I may have overreacted a tad. Not an essay, more like a rambling pretentious blog post.

Also, I think initially she recognized her newbie-ness to getting tattooed, but then through these random confrontations as a result of the tattoo felt she was suddenly catapulted to understanding what it is like to be "tattooed". None of us on here are without experiences full of people prying into the meaning of our tattoos, even when none exists. What did this lady expect?

And why would you get a tattoo as a result of a break-up? And a quote that basically states you understand all human suffering. Please. That epitomizes the douche-y white person mentality and it's getting old. I'll place it next to my deep-seated hatred of the hashtag 'firstworldproblems'.

Not to mention that the artist suggested making the tattoo into an image. And all she could imagine was a dragon with a thought bubble. Tell me how that idea doesn't have the text in it. What?!

[tatB]

When I got to the end of the article and it defined it as an essay in a series... I may have overreacted a tad. Not an essay, more like a rambling pretentious blog post.

I hope essay #2 in the series is titled: "Crawling black panthers make great coverups!"

I really have no issue with the tattoo. Nothing exciting to look at but she seems to like it so good for her.

[CultExciter]

I have some text-based art. I have a couple of pieces that chart the fonts of our local transit system over the last 60 years. I love that kind of graphical representation.

Me too. Massimo Vignelli is a design hero of mine (and everyone else).

[irezumi]

Chaz. No more need be said.

[polliwog]

Looks like she spent more time generating the pseudo-psychology justification than she did thinking about the actual tattoo.

Yup.

[SeeSea]

And why would you get a tattoo as a result of a break-up? And a quote that basically states you understand all human suffering. Please. That epitomizes the douche-y white person mentality and it's getting old. I'll place it next to my deep-seated hatred of the hashtag 'firstworldproblems'.

:: warily opens box ::

What bugs you about #firstworldproblems to generate deep seated hatred? Yeah, it's a bunch of winey-crap, but sometimes there's some social commentary that could use a second look. (Although it would be nice if those it was directed at actually *got* it.)

I'm not calling you out or anything - just curious.

Personally, I like the cat version of firstworldproblems. This one rings absolutely true in my house, as I buy cat food by the flat.

[HaydenRose]

@SeeSea no worries. I agree it can be used in an effective manner, but I think it also functions to make white/first-world people feel like they understand the woes of the world by being ironic and pointing it out. I believe it runs along the same lines as colorblind racism. The whole... "I'm not racist because I acknowledge there is a problem." Ok... but what are you doing about it? I'm not trying to spark a full-fledged discussion, just providing an explanation.

As you were...

[SeeSea]

... but I think it also functions to make white/first-world people feel like they understand the woes of the world by being ironic and pointing it out.

Ahhh, I see where you are coming from. Yeah, sigh.

Thanks for clarifying.

[polliwog]

I think what bothered me most about this article wasn't so much the author's navel-gazing (I can be guilty of that, though I don't try to publish it), but more that it appeared in the NY Times and that these are always the sorts of articles that appear in places like the Times. So all Millennials are narcissists who get pretentious Latin tattoos, or so you might conclude from reading these sorts of pieces everywhere. Then we get to read the inevitable op-eds about that. It's just lazy and dispiriting.

[cltattooing]

Completely ignoring most mainstream media publications on topics of pop culture has saved me a lot of frustration as a general rule. Reading that article helped remind me why I do that.

[/snob]

[KegRN]

Facebook has gotten really annoying - filling my feed with inspirational quotes that just HAVE to be rendered as a picture. I think that's because the poster is less interested feeling/enjoying in the actual quote and more interested in having the world think *they* are somehow an embodiment of the quote. I dunno - some are nice but it's just too much.

:

YES! This drives me crazy! One here or there, meh, but sometimes I have a person go crazy posting one right after another. But hey, first world problem, right? ;)

[SeeSea]

But hey, first world problem, right? ;)

Touché