Two stacked photos of black blackletter lettering reading Artoscience and philosophy across a forearm, with a faint red scar line running beneath.

Blackletter lettering on a forearm

Lettering · Forearm · Black and grey · Photo

The upper photo shows the word Artoscience in bold, angular blackletter script in solid black ink, spanning the forearm. The lower photo shows the word philosophy in similar blackletter, appearing rotated, with a faint red scar visible through the skin in both images. The lettering is crisp and evenly filled, set against plain skin in a simple close-up composition.

Lettering Forearm Lettering Word

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

The board had been leaning against the caravan for three winters before Oriel Vance decided it should say ARTOSCIENCE across the top, tall enough to read from the Hull road. I told her it was a mouthful. She said mouthfuls sold tickets. She wanted old black letter, the kind printers cut for church bills, all hooks and spurs, so the crowd would believe the Thinking Head inside had been written by monks.

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I loaded my sable and worked left to right while the generator coughed behind the dodgems. The trouble came with the second panel. Oriel wanted PHILOSOPHY on the reverse, set so that anyone walking round the booth would have to tilt their head to read it. I turned the stencil a quarter, then a half, and the spurs of the capitals began to lean into each other like drunk men at a bar. By dusk the word stood on its head and looked perfectly sensible.

On the last night a boy from the Saturday crowd stood in front of the board for a long time, lips moving. He read the top line aloud, then walked round to the back, tipped his head sideways and read the other. 'They say the same thing,' he said to nobody. Oriel laughed so hard she dropped her cigarette in the sawdust. I did not tell her the boy was right, because I had painted both sides with my own hand and still could not decide which one was upright.