A realistic colour portrait of a man in a studded black jacket, with red script lettering reading Michael Jackson, tattooed across a person's upper back.

Realistic portrait with red script on a back

Realism · Back · Mixed · Photo

A realistic portrait of a man with dark curly hair, wearing a studded black jacket, fills the centre of the back. Shading is smooth and detailed, with a blue wash behind the head, and the jacket is rendered in greys and black. Bold red script lettering sits beneath the portrait, reading Michael Jackson.

Realism Lettering Back Portrait Man Curly hair Script lettering

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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

Tuesday, 14 March. The jacket came back in this morning, still in the brown paper, and I knew before I unwrapped it that the left shoulder would be trouble. Ray had wanted the studs set in rows like a fishbone, two hundred and twelve of them, and he had drawn the pattern on the back of a bus ticket. I told him the leather would tear if I crowded them. He said I was to be careful, that the lights in the hall would catch every one.

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I gave it four evenings at the bench with the hand press and a tin of brass rivets. Mr Dhillon from the sign shop on Park Street lettered the name for the back panel in red enamel on a strip of card so I could follow the curve of it. His hand was steadier than mine. By the third night the studs sat in their fishbone, cold and bright under the bench lamp, and the whole thing looked like a poster for a night out nobody in Walsall could afford.

Ray didn't come for it on Saturday. His cousin rang on Monday to say he had gone to Coventry for an audition and would send for it once he was settled, which is what everyone says when they mean never. I hung the jacket on the rail by the window where the afternoon sun reaches it, and the red script threw a little colour onto the wall.

Tonight I found one stud had come loose at the hem, so I threaded a length of red silk through the eyelet and stitched it back, one small knot at a time. It will hold now. I have not decided whether to post it on or keep it here until someone asks for it by name.