Are we taking too many liberties with the word tattoo? I mean, tattoo traditionally means ink meeting skin and art occurring as a result. But the popularity of tattoo has brought about an ongoing flow of different art endeavours that also use the word tattoo to describe exactly what they are. At present time I can only remember the street tattoo artist from a few months back that I blogged about, but that was pretty cool. Today however, I stumbled upon this article that details the specifics on what is being called “hair tattoo”.
Hey, I’m not going to tell anyone that they can’t call what they are doing a form of tattoo, but to be fair, tattoo implies a permanent work of art. There’s pain involved. It isn’t as fleeting as a haircut. Still, I take my hat off to 24-year-old Ardy Shafiq Arshad for his skilled use of the razor at his Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia hair salon Hot Hot Cut. So what exactly does a hair tattoo consist of?
‘Explaining hair tattooing, Ardy, also known as Damis in the graffiti arena, said it involves colouring the hair in different shades and forming designs and words from the strands.
“It’s just like drawing except that the pencil and eraser is my razor.”‘
Okay, so it’s not the sort of tattoo that we here at Tattoo Blog are truly interested in, and giving it the name ‘hair tattoo’ is kind of just cashing in on the popularity of tattoo. But if Arshad can rustle up a passable portrait of Bill Cosby on to the back of my head, then I won’t complain about him calling this whatever the hell he wants.
I’ll be in KL by November, Ardy – see you then.