Realistic black and grey lion head tattoo with a full mane on a forearm, beside a printed lion reference image.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Realistic lion head on a forearm

Realism · Forearm · Black and grey · Photo

A realistic lion's head with a full, detailed mane fills the outer forearm, with the eyes, nose and whiskers rendered in fine tonal shading. The tattoo is in black and grey with soft gradients and some warmer brown tones in the fur. A printed black and white lion photograph sits beside the arm as a reference.

Realism Forearm Lion Mane Big cat Portrait

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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 photograph had come out of a Sunday supplement, folded in four, and Ada had pinned it above the bench where the gold leaf sat wrapped in tissue. The lion in it was not looking at the camera. It looked past the lens to something on the left, as if somebody had just said its name. Mr Okonedo wanted it on the proscenium of the Regal Ballroom before the Saturday dances, and he wanted it done in a fortnight, which meant Ada worked by the gas lamp after the cleaners had gone.

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She began with the mane, because a mane was mostly patience. She laid in umber at the roots, thinned the paint with turps until it was little more than a stain, and built the warm gold up in a thousand small strokes, each one a single hair's width. Her brush smelt of linseed. Out past the fire door the Brighton trams rattled by at the bottom of the hill, and somewhere under the floorboards the band was tuning up for a rehearsal that was never quite finished.

On the Thursday Mr Okonedo climbed the ladder with a cup of tea and said the eyes were too sad, could she lift them a bit, make the beast look keen. Ada said nothing. She painted the eyes that evening, amber with a black ring, and set a single white point of light in each one, the way the photograph had caught it. When Mr Okonedo came in on Saturday he stood at the foot of the ladder for a long time, then went to check the bar.

After the last waltz the hall emptied and the lamps went down one by one. Ada stayed on the ladder with her rag in her hand. Light from the street came through the high windows and found the lion's eyes, and for a moment they held the glow the way a cat's do, fixed on the dancers who had already gone home.