Black and grey dotwork mandala with a crescent moon centre tattooed between the shoulder blades of a person seen from behind, with dark paper petals draped over the shoulders.

Mandala and crescent moon on upper back

Dotwork · Back · Black and grey · Photo

A person with a shaved head is photographed from behind, showing a large mandala tattoo centred between the shoulder blades. The mandala has a crescent moon at its heart, surrounded by radiating geometric petals and fine stippled shading, with a dotted line running down from the top and a small dotted pendant shape below. The skin is pale and the background is a muted, softly lit grey-brown, with dark paper petals arranged across the shoulders and back.

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

The clock above platform four has stopped at twenty to nine for as long as anyone at Hallam Junction can remember, so I keep my own time by the lamp-lighter's round and the ticks of the signal bell. Mr Okonedo at the booking hall says the company meant to fix it in 1931 and then forgot, which is how most things here are kept.

Keep reading

I have been asked by the Ordnance men to chart the old night mail route before the line closes in March, and so each evening I walk the cutting with my theodolite and my ledger. Tonight the sky over the embankment was clear enough to take a bearing on the moon. It sat low above the water tower, a thin paring of white, and I drew the arc of it against the grid of the sleepers until my hand cramped. Where the rails cross the culvert there is a ring of iron bolts set in a circle, eight of them, each with a dot scratched beside it, and I counted them three times before I believed the pattern was deliberate.

I wrote to the Ordnance office that the circle is a turntable pit for a locomotive that was never delivered, and sent the sketch. The reply came back on Tuesday with a single line added in pencil at the bottom: the bolts line up with the moon's crescent on the first night of each month, and the railwaymen used to hold their lamps over the pit to signal the night train. Nobody has written that down anywhere but here.

I set the theodolite down on the culvert tonight and let the light go out of the sky. The bell rang once, and I did not go home.

More like this

Back of a woman with her hair in a bun, showing a black blackwork and dotwork mandala flower tattoo at the base of the neck with bold black lines sweeping over the shoulders.
Black mandala flower on upper back
Black and grey botanical bouquet tattoo with flowers, leaves and a tied ribbon on a woman's upper back, above a black lace dress.
Botanical bouquet on upper back
Realistic poppy flowers with green centres and two arrows with red fletching, tattooed on the upper chest in soft pink, green, and red tones.
Poppies and arrows on the upper chest
Black and grey botanical tattoo of lilies with sketched linework and ink splatter across the upper back, near the neck.
Lily bouquet across upper back
Black and white photo of a dotwork mandala tattoo centred on a woman's upper back, with her hair in a bun and her back to the camera.
Mandala tattoo on upper back
Black and grey dotwork mandala tattoo with lotus petals and a long pointed line running down the centre of a person's back.
Mandala and lotus tattoo on a back
Black linework tree with sparse branches and leaves, its trunk flowing down into a bird with spread wings, tattooed on the inner forearm in a botanical style.
Tree and bird on a forearm
Red and grey Celtic knotwork tattoo with a winged, symmetrical design across the upper back, shown on a person's bare shoulder blade.
Celtic knotwork winged design on upper back
Black ink tattoo of a pair of scissors cut through a horizontal line, with clawed hands on the upper chest and left shoulder, in blackwork and dotwork style.
Scissors and clawed hands across the chest
Back and shoulder tattoo of an abstract bird or feather in black linework with teal and pink watercolour splashes, shown in a fine line and geometric style.
Geometric bird with watercolour splashes on a back
Back of a person with a black and grey traditional style tattoo of roses, clasped hands holding a scroll that reads Everything we left unsaid, and a small coloured rose at the left shoulder, placed
Roses and clasped hands with script across upper back
Black and grey ornamental floral tattoo in dotwork and fine linework covering a woman's shoulder, upper arm and upper back.
Ornamental floral shoulder tattoo in black

From the plentytattoo archive, uploaded by a user. Is this your work? Ask for credit or removal.