Page 46 - Tattooing News Today

Behind bars, tattooing is more than a favorite pastime, its a passion, if not an addiction in every prison we visited. >> thats the first thing they do when they come in here, tattoo their body up. >> tattooings cool. its a fun thing to do. >> some of them dont make a bit of sense but they have them on there, theyre covered. they all want them. >> ive got a couple years on a grave stone down here, a couple of my prison years, just a bunch of evil, crazy stay stuff. i was going through a bunch of...

>> they get a motor, find a battery or electrical socket or something to drive this. >> spin the needle and it will go back and forth. >> we used to always joke if we were to ever accidentally leave a camera in prison overnight, that when we came back in the morning, it would be 15 tattoo guns. >> before being sent to the hole for practicing his craft, roger bosheres was a prolific tattoo artist at the spring creek correctional center in alaska. he feels punishing tattoo artists is to not recogn...

Tattooing, theft, unauthorized possession and assault. >> why? >> to fit in. i dont know. >> theft? >> to earn respect. theft. i took someones tv. he was a piece of [ bleep ]. thats crazy. whats that noise? >> yeah, im curious, too. >> our interview is cut short as massive amounts of water cascade into the cell block from the second tier. >> they flooded the tier. thats awesome. >> they are loving it. they are just absolutely loving it. all right. what happened? >> i have no idea. >> whats it lo...

>> apparently another inmate or two went into his cell and put some knots on his head and said dont be giving us anymore heat over here. we seen inman a day or two later, of course, he wont tell what happened or what it was over or anything like that, because thats a convict code. but we know what it was over. i got enough people out there telling me what it was over. >> and now things are about to heat up even more for inman as the prison disciplinary board takes up his case. >> hes been charge...

He feels punishing tattoo artists is to not recognize an opportunity. >> right now, if you get caught tattooing, you run the risk of getting in trouble. plus, i mean, its not as clean as it could be. its a highly sterilized process on the streets. all the shops and stuff, its very clinical. i mean, yeah, we clean things as best we can. but kind of ramshackle materials we have to use, pens and guitar strings and such. we dont have the autoclaves and sonic sterilizers and that stuff they have out ...

Due to mature subject matter, viewer discretion is advised. behind bars, tattooing is more than a favorite pastime, its a passion, if not an addiction in every prison we visited. >> thats the first thing they do when they come in here, tattoo their body up. >> tattooings cool. its a fun thing to do. >> some of them dont make a bit of sense but they have them on there, theyre covered. they all want them. >> ive got a couple years on a grave stone down here, a couple of my prison years, just a b...

But the inmates are very creative. they come up with methods to do it. >> its a serious enough violation that it can land an inmate in the hole for months. >> i just did 14 months in the hole. >> why? >> for tattooing. >> prison tattoos are applied with crude but ingenious homemade tat guns and ink that are often confiscated during cell searches. >> this here is several vials of ink and a homemade tattoo gun. >> they make their own tattoo guns out of electronic motors from portable radios or tap...

Swastikas, nazi imagery, and with the tattoos all over his face, first time i saw him peeking out of that cell i was definitely intimidated. >> curtis algire and his cousin tony peak were covered head to toe in tattoos. many of which were applied by algire, himself. >> i do my whole face, my left arm, my legs, my stomach. >> how do you deal with the pain? >> when you do it yourself, its not near as bad. >> in the prison system, we do not authorize or condone tattooing. but the inmates are very c...

>> this here is several vials of ink and a homemade tattoo gun. >> they make their own tattoo guns out of electronic motors from portable radios or tape players. >> they get a motor, find a battery or electrical socket or something to drive this. >> spin the needle and it will go back and forth. >> we used to always joke if we were to ever accidentally leave a camera in prison overnight, that when we came back in the morning, it would be 15 tattoo guns. >> before being sent to the hole for pract...

Particularly southern california latino street culture more than low riding. esteban is a photographer, chronicler of everything iconic at the crossroads of hip hop, design, tattooing, fashion, and low riding. >> they used to put sandbags in their trunks to make them lower and around the 70s they got popular. >> why these particular models? >> pretty much always been the late 50s all the way through the 60s and into the 70s and in the 80s they brought in the cadillacs and the regales. the most c...