SHILLONG: If you have decided to get a traditional tattoo on your body, there are several designs and tattoo artists who can customize your idea into a unique piece of artwork.
Welcome to the world of tiles tattoo that is most sought after now. In this art, several tiles are displayed before the customer who chooses according to their idea and design they are looking for. These tiles come in various designs ranging from flower, gods, logos and much more.
A tattoo is a permanent piece of artwork which reflects a person’s style and personality and one such artist from Jail Road area of the city through his roadside tattoo business is ensuring that customers gets the best deal from his tiles.
He said that people have craze for his tattoos, which are inked into a person’s body by pressing the tiles. In this style of tattooing there is no discussion about a particular design that a customer is looking for or that being sketched by the tattoo artists before drilling it into the body.
Equally sized, these tattoos are mainly adorned on hands by customers. “We also get customers who want to get an imprint on the back of their neck or on the upper part of their chest – particularly those with spiritual and religious logos,” said the tattoo artist.
He also said that new tiles keep on hitting the market as they have to cater to the needs of customers’ choices. On asking how long these tattoos last he said that they are as good as any other tattoos.
There are many advantages to these tattoos then the penetrating ones. According to this artist, there are no health risks from these types of tattoos since naturally dyed inks are used for imprints. “These inks have no allergic reactions than the sterilized inks that electrically powered tattoo machine uses,” said the artist who also deals in drilling machine tattoo – which injects ink into a person’s skin. He is echoed by a doctor who said that in drilling, skin is broken as the needle pierces into the skin thousands of times in a minute and deposit drops of insoluble ink with each of those pierces and it involves health risks like skin infection, fungal infections, forms of hepatitis, tetanus, allergic reactions et al.
“But there are modern use of tattooing where you can see artists used single used items and sterilize equipment post use like in saloons,” said the doctor, who did not want to be named.
The tattoo artist said that those who are conscious of such effects prefer the tiles tattoos as they are safer in almost all ways.
