Marcin is one of the guys behind Swallows & Daggers website. Its is an online blog and print magazine that focuses on traditional and neo-traditional tattooing hit the link above for more info. This time we had a chance to shoot and ask couple of questions.
BigSmokeTeam: How it all started?
Marcin: I’m not really sure.. I only remember that i really wanted to get a tattoo, not a small stupid stamp but a real tattoo and it happened that there was a guy around who tattooed some of my older friends so I’ve hooked up with him and he did my old school flames from my wrist up to the elbow. But then again i wanted to get more and more tattooed.
BigSmokeTeam: When and why did you do your first tattoo? What did your Mum say?
Marcin: As I’ve mentioned above.. I just had that need. I think that as a disenchanted young lad i was angry about the way things were back then, one big sadness, hostile and narrow-minded society, selfishness, bigotry, racism and all that crap that i wanted to express my anger somehow.. I always like things one way or another, no middle path and not conforming to society’s rules. Its like when people around you compete about stupid things and nobody cares about other people, you don’t want to have much to do with this disease.
I’ve told my Mum its gonna be a small flames around my wrist, but the day i told her about, I’ve already had it done :)) she wasn’t mad or anything because she knew im not a criminal or i dont go robbing people or fighting or any of this crap like my well dressed school-mates did. My father didn’t notice until like 4 months passed but he never cared, hehe.
BigSmokeTeam: Why did you choose to cover your body only in traditional tattoo?
Marcin: I’ve started to get stuff done around ’99 so it was the time when cheesy new school or bad bio-mechanics were cool. I hated all that and been trying to find something more, maybe not stylish but original.. so i reached to the traditional school and it suited me the most. My first tattoo was pretty simple but tradition, because traditional tattooing is more about lines, basic colours and typical traditional shading, not just motives. I couldn’t get into cartoony stuff, i never liked bio-mechanics and i think traditional tattoos are best for me and have the spirit, you know.
BigSmokeTeam: How many separate tattoos would you have together if you were to count?
Marcin: It’d be about 32, some are smaller, other are bigger, hard to count them as seperate pieces.
I guess it really depends on a person, some do it to get girls other just because they like tattoos.
And it also depends on the country how people react, i.e in Ireland everyone’s really nice, polite or fun about this, they ask questions wether it hurts, etc.
In Germany people will give you looks but not necessary bad looks, they seem just curious.
Problems start in Eastern European countries like Poland or Czech Rep where you wil get odd one asking about tattoos or piercings but most will give abuse, shout at you or make stupid remarks. It’s a shame but i guess it just takes time for changes to happen. In cities like Krakow there’s a huge tattoo scene so you get alot of people heavily tattoed, like Edek (i think he finished his apprenticeship not long ago: Edek’s MySpace check out his stuff, its damn good!) or people from 9th Circle Tattoo or the whole Kult Tattoo crew, they’ve got alot of ink and still growing strong so hopefully it’ll get better soon! :)
Marcin: Yeah, many, hehe, I’m gonna laser off half of the old stuff i’ve got as I was way too young when i got them done and now i preffer to save more money and get tattoed by most talented tattoo artists.. I still have left sleeve to be done which most probably will be done by Jurgen Eckel (my fav artist), huge skull on my belly by Matty D’Arienzo when he comes back to Europe, I want to get my head and forehead done. Im taking it slow now as i’d rather wait and get my head around the designs, ideas etc than get something just to have more tattoos.
Marcin: Good question.. It’ll sound cheesy but.. life. The second is mostly from music, like i’ve got Liberate te ex inferis (save yourself from hell) and its from album title by Zao – christian hardcore band (but then again, they took it from the Event Horizon movie), No Love Can Save Me tattoo is from song title by The Carrier, X on my hand means im Vegan Straight Edge (i dont eat anything that comes from animal exploitation, i don’t drink or smoke or do any drugs, simply living life sober and i love it, like that).
Marcin: Yeah, deffo, it’ll be Jurgen Eckel, Matty D’Arienzo, Xam, Joseph Deegan, Lu’s Lips, Eric Michalovic, Chad Koeplinger, Adrian from Magnum Opus, my dream is to go to States and get tattoed by Smith Street (NYC) artists and Spider Murphy crew. But there’s much more great artists.
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I will try to be concrete here. Great photos, that’s one. Great tattoos!! that’s two.
Another great photo session – this time with an very original and interesting subject. The lighting is awesome and very well with the off camera work.
Well done Guys :)
hi marty, who would you recommend for doing some traditional stuff when it comes to the polish ta2 scene?
hiya Barry.. deffo it’d be Padawan (Marcin Domanski), he knows that trad is not just about motives but also shading and linework.. Unfortunately there’s almost no others who do trad stuff in Poland, its a shame :(
In Poland I’d reccomand Doman (M.Domanski) or Pawel Wyrebiak from 3rd eye
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