The Philadelphia Tattoo Arts Convention is coming up again; March 26th-28th 2010. John J. Joyce is considering attending/cutting again this year so I’m spreading the word: If you’d like to be cut by John in Philadelphia you can contact him through the Scarab Website. Every person who gets cut by John at the convention will get a drawing of a monkey by either my girlfriend or my nephew as a present.

This reminder comes with another Gogo appearance; again from SW3 in Philly back in 2007, Photographed by Casey Goldsmith.

When I was preparing the second SW in late 2005 I received a letter in the mail from a young lady who was confirming her invite for the West Coast event. Most people took care of that online, but Sam went oldschool with actual mail and, in a move that I still find adorable, included a photocopy of her driver’s license so I’d be able to recognize her at the event.

I was fortunate enough to have booked my friend Rachel (owner of BME and all around renaissance woman*) as the portrait photographer for that event; while the photo on Sam’s driver’s license was good, the pictures Rachel captured of her are, I think, much more flattering. (I think I still have that photocopy somewhere)

(PS: you can see more of Sam here, here, here and here. Her lotus cutting was done by John Joyce and Brian Decker.

*Rachel would like it mention that, despite my claim of her being a renaissance woman, she will not be eating any turkey legs at the Renn Faire.

This piece was done at Scar Wars 3 in Philadelphia in 2007, which means in this photo it is almost 2 years old. Sam scars so much more dramatically than the average person, which is part of the reason that I love working on her. I have some pics of her other side which will go up when I get back from Vegas!

This piece was done at Scar Wars 2 in LA, which was 3, maybe 4 years ago?? Man, time flies….
Anyway, this is what it looks like as of a couple days ago. Brian Decker was working on this piece while I was watching, and holding Sam’s hand, offering my support. He asked if i wanted to help out and I jumped at the chance. We pretty much split the piece down the middle, him working on one side, and myself on the other.

I just received a few more pics from Sam of the work I did on her ribs which I will post later today or tomorrow. And if you are in the Santa Cruz area, you can check out Sam and her boyfriend at their new studio Way Body Arts.

Photo by Natalee.

I have so many good photos of the superlovely Sam that I need to post; portraits, procedural shots and even video are all waiting to be added to the daily update queue. Tonight’s post features the equally amazing John Joyce doing an amazing cutting on her ribs at the SW3 event back in October of 2007. Healed photos are lined up for future updates, so check back soon!

As of tomorrow my regular updates will be on hold for a few days while Claire and I head out to New Orleans for a little mini-vacation/birthday celebration. There may be an artist update or two… cross your fingers.

Despite a previous post that suggested that scarification does in fact hurt, my friend Sam doesn’t seem to be in too much pain while having her chest done at SW2 in Socal.

Sam has some of the most amazing healed cuttings that I’ve ever seen… I have more photos of her ready to upload because she’s just that perfect. Word is that she and her fella (who wears some impressive scars as well) are in the process of opening a shop out West… cheers guys, and best of luck!

Photo by Atom Moore.