How Tattoo Culture Reclaims Space, Empowerment and Irishness
With tattoo culture becoming more and more popular, Ireland has to offer hundreds of tattoo studios across the country. The quiet corner of Navan, County Meath is a home for a bright and pink tattoo studio Calamity Jane, run by a proudly female and LGBTQ+ centered artist Lisa, who is not just inking bodies, but rewriting the narrative of an art form that has been male-dominated, misunderstood and culturally taboo in Irish Culture.
Named after the fierce and unapologetic Western musical heroine, Calamity Jane, is a lot more than a nod to Lisa’s love for the musical. It is a statement! The studio celebrates female empowerment and deliberately contrasts with the traditionally “boy shop” energy that has long been defined by the tattoo world. As Lisa expresses, the hyper-masculine spaces “weren’t my vibe”, therefore, she created a pink, comfortable and safe space for everyone, particularly for women to feel welcomed.
However, the road to this moment was not easy. Like many young women who aspire to break into tattooing, Lisa’s artistic journey began with school notebooks filled with drawings, hours spent researching favourite magazines and musical idols covered with ink. Despite this, it took Lisa over five years of searching before she landed an apprenticeship, a path that remains one of the few truly effective and ethical ways to learn the craft and enter the tattooing industry. While it is amazing to see the industry growing there are some issues that arise as a result of this: “It is not possible to start tattooing from a few tattoo courses and tattoo schools. Good apprenticeships take years” Lisa states. With the industry becoming more and more popular, Lisa has noticed an influx of new people, who think that tattooing is easy. One of the major concerns within the tattoo industry is the rise of poorly trained artists bypassing traditional apprenticeships in favour of short courses or self-teaching, which often leads to poor quality of works and even health risks. Lisa argues that tattooing requires years of practice and studying in order to provide your client with amazing and high quality designs. When asked how this issue could be resolved, Lisa says: “I wish we had more regulation, just to keep tabs on who is coming in and having a licence and keep it professional with new artists in the shop. Apprenticeships are a solid way to learn - slow and steady”. It is not about gatekeeping: it’s about professionalism and care in practice!
Within the rise of tattoo popularity, we have noticed that there is a rising embrace of Irish identity through tattoos. The Irish symbols such as green postboxes, claddagh rings, Guinness pints or meaningful words “As Gaeilge” are making a comeback, proudly worn by a younger generation reasserting their cultural identity: “It’s amazing to see young people embracing their culture, that has been taken away from us and fully embracing that is so nice to see!” Lisa says. In multicultural, modern Ireland, the ink on our skin is becoming a quiet rebellion against once felt shame and erasure.
“I love it, I do think it is a trend, but this is a great trend”
With the embrace of Irish culture, revival of Y2K aesthetic and rise of cybersigilism tattoos, the days are never boring for Calamity Jane. What makes tattoos unique and what keeps the artists from burning out, is a variety of new and creative ideas clients bring to the shop: “nice thing about tattooing - different people have different ideas”. Clients no longer flip through binders of flash art, hoping to find something “cool”. Instead, they bring in personal stories, cultural references, or emotional milestones, asking for tattoos that mean something. The artist, then, becomes a translator, working together with a client to bring their ideas into life on their bodies. Lisa and the rest of the team from Calamity Jane are not only drawing tattoo designs, they are sketching out a new cultural identity: proudly feminist, artistically rich and unapologetically Irish.
Tattoos, once hidden under sleeves are now being celebrated, not just as a fashion, but as a way of story telling. The body now has become a canvas for self expression, identity and connection. The ink is permanent, but the culture it helps to create is ever evolving, and thanks to the amazing and creative tattoo shops such as Calamity Jane, the tattoo culture is heading in the right direction.
Written By Ieva Dambrauskaite
Edited By Alex Kelleher (@alex_kelleher_)
