Black and grey blackwork tattoo of tribal patterns on the shoulders and upper arms, with fine script lettering across the chest and a forearm lettering piece, on a shirtless torso.

Chest script and tribal shoulder tattoos on a torso

Blackwork · Chest · Black and grey · Photo

The photograph shows a shirtless torso with black tattoos covering the chest, shoulders and upper arms. Dense tribal-style patterns with solid black fills sit on the shoulders and upper arms, while handwritten-style script runs in lines across the chest. Lettering also appears on the lower abdomen and on the forearm, and the image is shot close and warmly lit, with the subject's face cropped out of frame.

Blackwork Lettering Chest Shoulder Upper arm Forearm Other Script text Tribal pattern Lettering Torso

Find an artist for this

Take it to an artist as a reference. A good artist will make it yours rather than copy someone else's tattoo.

A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Nan,

Keep reading

The rain has not let up since Tuesday, so the whole of Hallam Street Market smells of wet cardboard and the sprouts nobody bought. I have been up a ladder all morning lettering the new sign over Mrs Okafor's fishmonger's, which she wanted in gold leaf but could only afford in black enamel. I told her black would hold better in weather, and she said she'd take my word for it because I had the steadiest hand on the row.

Something about the job has been sitting with me. She gave me a scrap of paper with a verse on it, her late husband's favourite, and asked me to lay it out in lines the way he used to write his delivery ledger, slanting and tight, the capitals leaning like men leaning into wind. I spent two evenings at the kitchen table with a ruler and a cheap pencil, counting letters so each line would sit square under the one above. The trouble is a sign has to be read from across the street, so every word has to be bold enough to survive the drizzle.

Today the enamel went on in the morning, and by noon the rain was running down the glass in thin grey rivers. I stood under the awning and watched the first line blur, then the second, and I thought I had ruined it. But when the afternoon came the paint had set, and the lines stood firm under the water, black on white, the rain beading off the letters as if the verse was shedding it on purpose.

Mrs Okafor came out with two cups of tea, read the sign from the pavement, and said nothing for a long while. Then she said, "He always did say the words would outlast the weather." I did not tell her I had never once looked at the words properly until I had to copy them.

Love, Tom