Jay Brown: Coeur d’Alene’s Blue Rose Tattoo – An Interview with Robert McNeill (Part III)
By Jay Brown In Northern Idaho there is the lake town of Coeur d’Alene, actually more of a city than a town. In the sea of tattooing these days, some of the old timers really shine through as great tattooers as well as incredible artists, one of those is Robert McNeill. I recently got a chance to stop in to see him at his studio on 4th Street right in the heart of downtown Coeur d’Alene. Blue Rose Tattoo is a clean, comfortable shop, with lots of incredible artwork adorning the walls, all of which is either Japanese or American Traditional tattoo designs, all painted by Robert. And speaking of painting, Robert is incredible at that, pin-ups I think being one of his strong points, but he can do anything, all in all Robert is one of those artists that can create on skin as well as he can on paper or canvas. So after we were done with the hellos and the pleasantries, we got down to the interview, which wound up being 43 minutes long, so I am gonna edit things, cause I don’t have enough pictures to go with that many pages, and that’s a lot of pages so we’re gonna trim it down a bit, although it was a great interview all the way through, but we’re not writing a book, but I digress… Yes, so the interview. I hope you enjoy… [Editor's Note: Jay's interview, due to its length, will be broken into three weekly installments, this is Part III of III.]
Jay Brown: Coeur d’Alene’s Blue Rose Tattoo – An Interview with Robert McNeill (Part II)
By Jay Brown In Northern Idaho there is the lake town of Coeur d’Alene, actually more of a city than a town. In the sea of tattooing these days, some of the old timers really shine through as great tattooers as well as incredible artists, one of those is Robert McNeill. I recently got a chance to stop in to see him at his studio on 4th Street right in the heart of downtown Coeur d’Alene. Blue Rose Tattoo is a clean, comfortable shop, with lots of incredible artwork adorning the walls, all of which is either Japanese or American Traditional tattoo designs, all painted by Robert. And speaking of painting, Robert is incredible at that, pin-ups I think being one of his strong points, but he can do anything, all in all Robert is one of those artists that can create on skin as well as he can on paper or canvas. So after we were done with the hellos and the pleasantries, we got down to the interview, which wound up being 43 minutes long, so I am gonna edit things, cause I don’t have enough pictures to go with that many pages, and that’s a lot of pages so we’re gonna trim it down a bit, although it was a great interview all the way through, but we’re not writing a book, but I digress… Yes, so the interview. I hope you enjoy…[Editor's Note: Jay's interview, due to its length, will be broken into three weekly installments, this is Part II of III.]
Jay Brown: Coeur d’Alene’s Blue Rose Tattoo – An Interview with Robert McNeill (Part I)
By Jay Brown In Northern Idaho there is the lake town of Coeur d’Alene, actually more of a city than a town. In the sea of tattooing these days, some of the old timers really shine through as great tattooers as well as incredible artists, one of those is Robert McNeill. I recently got a chance to stop in to see him at his studio on 4th Street right in the heart of downtown Coeur d’Alene. Blue Rose Tattoo is a clean, comfortable shop, with lots of incredible artwork adorning the walls, all of which is either Japanese or American Traditional tattoo designs, all painted by Robert. And speaking of painting, Robert is incredible at that, pin-ups I think being one of his strong points, but he can do anything, all in all Robert is one of those artists that can create on skin as well as he can on paper or canvas. So after we were done with the hellos and the pleasantries, we got down to the interview, which wound up being 43 minutes long, so I am gonna edit things, cause I don’t have enough pictures to go with that many pages, and that’s a lot of pages so we’re gonna trim it down a bit, although it was a great interview all the way through, but we’re not writing a book, but I digress… Yes, so the interview. I hope you enjoy… [Editor's Note: Jay's interview, due to its length, will be broken into three weekly installments, this is Part I of III.] (more…)
Jay Brown Provides Inside Look at The Northwest Tattoo Museum
By Jay Brown
The Northwest Tattoo Museum is a project that was started almost two years ago when in a conversation it was suggested that there needs to be a tattoo museum in the Northwestern US. In answer to this call myself (a longtime tattoo artist of 24 years at the time) and avid hoarder of everything tattoo, and my fiancé Jennifer DeRose, who is an anthropologist/archaeologist decided to take on the challenge. I then dug out my collection of tattoo machines, old flash and other stuff I had piled up over the years while Jennifer started building the database for the museum’s collection… (more…)
Michael “Pogo” Kortez
Story and photos by Marco Annunziata
Jonathan Shaw couldn’t have use better words to introduce Pogo: “Michael was born in a circus tent on the outskirts of Guadalajara, Mexico. The bastard offspring of an itinerant Chicharon farmer and a mentally challenged Tattooed Lady, young Pogo became intrigued with the art of tattooing from an early age. After seeing two pigs copulating behind an abandoned brassiere factory, his first tattoo, inspired by that memorable event, was a surprisingly realistic rendition of a pair of naughty porkers, encircled by a banner reading, MAKIN’ BACON… (more…)
Jay Brown: ‘Coil Guys For Life’ Book Review
By Jay Brown Coil Guys For Life, Handmade Tattoo Machines and Their Builders, by Dano Collins is a compilation of 34 tattoo machine builders and their stories, or bios if you prefer, their art, their tattooing and of course their tattoo machines. This hardbound book covers a wide array of machine builders from the old-schoolers to the new generation of machine builders. This book contains a broad spectrum of builds from practical, to absolutely wild, to fine art. Every page shows great work from these fine craftsmen of the electric coil-type tattooing machine… (more…)
Jay Brown: Fred Marquand – The Story of an Unknown Northwest Tattooer
By Jay Brown
Fred Marquand is not a name that you first associate with old-school tattooers. Most think of Waters, Zeis, Jensen, Rogers, Wagner, Barber, Moore, Tuttle, Bowery Stan Moscowitz and his brother Walter (their father was a tattooist as well), Crazy Philadelphia Eddie and the like, but the name Marquand doesn’t come up in many conversations… (more…)
Jay Brown: The Rosini Award and The Ink Travelers Tattoo Convention
By Jay Brown
Every tattooer says, “I wanna tattoo till the day I die!” But only a few have done it, and only one that I know of has actually tattooed the day he died at a tattoo convention. To honor this man an award was created, and now 10 years later the list of recipients has become quite a prestigious one. Now the convention was/is the Ink Travelers Tattoo Convention in Vancouver, Washington and the tattooer was R.J. Rosini, a man many say that they definitely broke the mold after he was born…
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Omar Edmison: Who the Hell Does This Guy Think He Is?
By Omar Edmison
In this age of websites, magazines, blogs, TV shows and a vast myriad of other such social networking venues the tattoo world has shrunk. There are lots of super-talented kids out there tattooing who are doing mind-bending work that everyone knows about. Their names are talked about in excited conversations in tattoo shops springing up on every corner in every town with a population larger than 200 all over the world. Some are even being spoken in hushed reverent tones as the new “legends” of tattooing. There are more people tattooing now than ever before. They are more widely recognized than ever before the age of the “tattoo celebrity” is upon us. The possibilities are seemingly endless for a young up-and-coming kid with talent and ambition…
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