Tattoos no longer taboo

Fairfax

INKED: Tattoos are becoming more acceptable in everyday society.

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Matt Gordon didn't have to argue with his dad over his first tattoo - they got them together.

It was soon after the Bali bombings in October 2002 and Matt's brother Luke, now 25, had been caught in the Sari Club and was recovering in hospital.

A Cronulla boy by birth, Matt was only 15 when he decided to get the Southern Cross and a map of Australia emblazoned on his skin, while his father, Darrel, went for the Australian flag on his back, his first tattoo: "We just wanted to show that, despite what happened, we're Aussies and we're proud of it," Matt said.

The medium the Gordons chose is as significant as their message. The tattoo has risen from a subculture to mainstream art form and the trend has forced institutions worldwide - from the military to corporate employers - to relax their rules and let people fly their colours freely.

Tony Cohen has seen the high and low ends of that rise. He got his first tattoo at 14 and received a roasting from his dad for his troubles; his skin is now three-quarters covered with ink.

When Cohen set up the Illustrated Man parlour near Central Station in 1984, there were only three licensed artists in Sydney. Now there are more than 50 in NSW.

Cohen said other things had changed as well: "Way back in the 1960s, you had to open up a shop next to a pub just to keep alive," he said. "It's more about the designs nowadays - if someone comes in here drunk and says they want this or that, I just show them the door."

There are other things Cohen does not tolerate any more. He has grown tired of tattooing names on people, and won't do anything he finds offensive - a swastika, for instance.

"I've worked on everyone from doctors to lawyers to school teachers," he said. "For World Youth Day, I had a group [of pilgrims] come in here asking for designs - rosary beads, mainly, or a portrait of Jesus. I love it. If I had my choice I would be an octopus - full of ink and able to paint four people at once."

For Cohen, the acceptance of tattoos in popular culture was initiated by those responsible for selling it: advertisers, television executives and celebrities.

In the United States, a soft-drink called Inked was recently launched by 7-Eleven aimed at people who sport tattoos; a television show centred around a tattoo parlour, Miami Ink, recently went to air and Volvo has used tattooed models in its advertisements.

A US poll found that 36 per cent of people between the ages of 18 and 29 had a tattoo and although there are no figures for Australia, bosses here have taken note of a change.

In June 2006, one of the nation's biggest and most conservative employers, the Defence Force, lifted a rule that allowed it to bar anyone with a tattoo from joining up.

A Defence spokesman said tattoos were now allowed on any part of the body, whether "openly visible or covered by clothing", except for the face, though even that is not off limits if the tattoo is for religious or cultural reasons.

Imogen Lamport, and image consultant and director of Bespoke Image in Melbourne, said corporate employers were more willing to accommodate tattoos, but they still carried social stigmas.

"In law or finance, where people's life savings are on the line, they want to feel that the person they are dealing with is not a risk-taker and a tattoo is often associated with youthful risk-taking," she said.

That's not how Matt Gordon sees it. His right arm is a patchwork quilt of caricatures and slogans. In many ways, he said, the designs reflect his life story, which he is proud to wear on his sleeve. All his family members are there, as is his girlfriend, and mottos he picked up along the way, such as "love kills slowly".

He has come to accept the tattoos are going to be around for a long time. "That's the point," he said.