Many artists work on canvas, on paper, on wood. The artists whose works are on exhibit starting Saturday, July 18, at Vernon Community Arts Center use the most difficult medium of all: human bodies.
“Tattooing is just another medium, another tool, another canvas, but it’s a living medium. It breathes. It hurts. You can’t do more than three to five hours a day,” said Alin Tomoroga. “Other canvases don’t complain.”
Tomoroga, a Vernon resident who works at Propaganda Tattoo Studio in Manchester, is the curator of “The Tattoo Explosion,” an exhibit of about 90 artworks by about 25 Connecticut artists who work in tattoos or are influenced by tattoo culture and the tattoo aesthetic.
The show features photographs of elaborate tattoos, prints of tattoo designs, paintings by artists whose day job is creating tattoos and informational panels about the history of tattooing.
Tomoroga, who began his tattoo career in his native Romania, contributes several photographs of his own work, which include renditions of the Campanile Tower in Springfield, two soldiers in Vietnam, a 3-D Roman numeral and an extraordinary full sleeve simulating a rock carving using ancient Puerto Rican Taino imagery.
Eye-catching tattoo work by Kelly Green of Nautilus Tattoo in Newington and Alex Vidaud of Awesome Tattoo in Hartford hang in the gallery with work by Jose Gomez, a tattooist at Ink Studio FX in Manchester, who contributed several of his surrealist paintings.
Tomoroga said he hopes the tattoo exhibit becomes an annual event.
Joan Sonnanburg, executive director of Vernon Community Arts Center — which recently was renamed Arts Center East — said “I’ve always been intrigued by the idea of tattoo art, of tying in the image with the shape and the form of the body,” she said. “Tattoo is all about pain and beauty and permanence, which is ironic, the idea of permanence on our bodies, which are ephemeral.”
THE TATTOO EXPLOSION: A CULTURAL PHENOMENON is at Vernon Community Arts Center (Arts Center East), 709 Hartford Turnpike in Vernon, from July 18, opening with a reception from 7 to 10 p.m., until Aug. 15. Tattooed people are encouraged to attend the opening, in shorts and tank tops to best display their body art. vernonarts.org
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