love me when you see this.” She lays Atlantic Arts next to my coffee.
A teaser headline on the cover catches my eye: GET THE LADY BANKSY’S FRESH TAKE ON STREET ART.
Stella instantly flips to the story: it’s big, bold and spans ten pages. I flip through the article as Stella stands by and sips her coffee, and the reality of what’s happening sinks in.
This is real.
This is important.
I made art, and somehow, perhaps for the first time, it mattered.
That’s why I’m a tattoo artist—because ink shot deep beneath skin is one of the most intense, lifelong, permanent statements a person can make. It’s a commitment. And while I know my work affects that person and maybe the people they’re closest to, it never really feels like it matters beyond them.
But when I make art on a wall or on canvas, it’s possible that my art can live for generations. For centuries.
Violet’s photos of my street art feel as fleeting as the work itself. One reveals a large stencil painted near a tree cloaked in intense fall plumage. Another shows small children running in the foreground, their faces and bodies a blur except for primary-color clothes, and my stencil punctuates the stillness in the background.
I’m pretty sure Violet could take photos of wadded-up Kleenex and make it look exciting.
“Like what you see?” Stella whispers, as I turn the pages slowly.
“I love it.” My face spreads into a genuine smile and I walk around the counter, wrapping Stella in the world’s most awkward hug-from-a-non-hugger. And yet, I feel like I have to. Here’s this crazy woman who’s been stalking me, who’s preserved my artwork even when taggers and anti-graffiti squads painted over it, and now I have a real body of work to show.
***
I know she’s not here for a tattoo in an instant. Her one-shouldered, belted gray dress says money and her heeled booties tap too loudly on the floor. Wide, cat’s-eye sunglasses perched on her head hold back jet-black hair. She studies me with dark eyes.
“You’re Willa.” It’s not a question.
“Are you … Sadie?” I finger the shop’s appointment log but I remember my next client is much closer to my age, under thirty, and voluptuous.
This woman is closer to fifty, skinny as a praying mantis, and her skin is strangely smooth. Like, immobile.
“I’m Patricia.” She smiles but it doesn’t crease the skin around her eyes. She’s holding out a hand and my instincts catch up slowly to remember some manners. I grasp that bird-like hand, speckled in flashing stones, and shake.
She withdraws a silver case from her handbag, then passes me a thick, embossed cream card: PATRICIA ALTON: FINE ART COLLECTIONS.
“How can I help you?” I ask, hoping she doesn’t want a tattoo on her leathery skin. She’s definitely had too much fun in the sun.
“You’re Willa, right?” Her eyes cut to the Atlantic Arts issue, still lying open on my counter.
Shit. How did she find me? The only things in the article that identify me are my first name and that blurry photo, right?
After a beat of silence, she adds, “The pink hair gave it away.”
I ignore her and snatch up the magazine, focusing on the caption beneath my photo. When Willa’s not creating new street art somewhere in New York City or beyond, she’s creating more personal works of art for her clients at her Lower East Side tattoo shop.
Well, shit on a shingle. Stella didn’t name Righteous Ink in the story, but there aren’t more than a half-dozen places you’d have to look to find me. Calling each one of them and asking, “Hi, do you have a female tattoo artist with pink hair named Willa?” would work.
Fuck. Fuckity fuck fuck. Warning bells go off in my brain, but I’m so stunned by the fact that my privacy just got obliterated that I’ve got tunnel vision.
You just have to get through the next five minutes.
And then the next five.
I plaster a false smile on my face and step back from the counter slightly,
A teaser headline on the cover catches my eye: GET THE LADY BANKSY’S FRESH TAKE ON STREET ART.
Stella instantly flips to the story: it’s big, bold and spans ten pages. I flip through the article as Stella stands by and sips her coffee, and the reality of what’s happening sinks in.
This is real.
This is important.
I made art, and somehow, perhaps for the first time, it mattered.
That’s why I’m a tattoo artist—because ink shot deep beneath skin is one of the most intense, lifelong, permanent statements a person can make. It’s a commitment. And while I know my work affects that person and maybe the people they’re closest to, it never really feels like it matters beyond them.
But when I make art on a wall or on canvas, it’s possible that my art can live for generations. For centuries.
Violet’s photos of my street art feel as fleeting as the work itself. One reveals a large stencil painted near a tree cloaked in intense fall plumage. Another shows small children running in the foreground, their faces and bodies a blur except for primary-color clothes, and my stencil punctuates the stillness in the background.
I’m pretty sure Violet could take photos of wadded-up Kleenex and make it look exciting.
“Like what you see?” Stella whispers, as I turn the pages slowly.
“I love it.” My face spreads into a genuine smile and I walk around the counter, wrapping Stella in the world’s most awkward hug-from-a-non-hugger. And yet, I feel like I have to. Here’s this crazy woman who’s been stalking me, who’s preserved my artwork even when taggers and anti-graffiti squads painted over it, and now I have a real body of work to show.
***
I know she’s not here for a tattoo in an instant. Her one-shouldered, belted gray dress says money and her heeled booties tap too loudly on the floor. Wide, cat’s-eye sunglasses perched on her head hold back jet-black hair. She studies me with dark eyes.
“You’re Willa.” It’s not a question.
“Are you … Sadie?” I finger the shop’s appointment log but I remember my next client is much closer to my age, under thirty, and voluptuous.
This woman is closer to fifty, skinny as a praying mantis, and her skin is strangely smooth. Like, immobile.
“I’m Patricia.” She smiles but it doesn’t crease the skin around her eyes. She’s holding out a hand and my instincts catch up slowly to remember some manners. I grasp that bird-like hand, speckled in flashing stones, and shake.
She withdraws a silver case from her handbag, then passes me a thick, embossed cream card: PATRICIA ALTON: FINE ART COLLECTIONS.
“How can I help you?” I ask, hoping she doesn’t want a tattoo on her leathery skin. She’s definitely had too much fun in the sun.
“You’re Willa, right?” Her eyes cut to the Atlantic Arts issue, still lying open on my counter.
Shit. How did she find me? The only things in the article that identify me are my first name and that blurry photo, right?
After a beat of silence, she adds, “The pink hair gave it away.”
I ignore her and snatch up the magazine, focusing on the caption beneath my photo. When Willa’s not creating new street art somewhere in New York City or beyond, she’s creating more personal works of art for her clients at her Lower East Side tattoo shop.
Well, shit on a shingle. Stella didn’t name Righteous Ink in the story, but there aren’t more than a half-dozen places you’d have to look to find me. Calling each one of them and asking, “Hi, do you have a female tattoo artist with pink hair named Willa?” would work.
Fuck. Fuckity fuck fuck. Warning bells go off in my brain, but I’m so stunned by the fact that my privacy just got obliterated that I’ve got tunnel vision.
You just have to get through the next five minutes.
And then the next five.
I plaster a false smile on my face and step back from the counter slightly,
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