Friday the 18th started the 8th Annual SLC Tattoo Convention, bringing artists from all over the world to a city that nobody would expects to have a tattoo convention. I made my first and definitely not my last trip to the convention yesterday. It takes up a one of the halls in the Salt Palace and this year there are a tad over 100 tattoo shops and vendors so there is plenty to see. When I walked in I was a bit overwhelmed. I was still dressed for work so I got a lot of strange looks from a lot of people, I guess business attire at a tattoo convention is wrong. I had always thought that you only went to the convention to get tattooed or if you were a tattoo artist but there was a lot of art there from some very awesome people, if I could afford it I’d go back today and buy up a lot more art. There are also the tattoo competitions and live belly dancing every day. Admission is $20 for a day pass.

Thanks to a recommendation from Dave Styer of Geekleetist.com I had a tattoo appointment with Mike Groves from Pain and Wonder Tattoo out of Athens, Georgia. That was extra awesome because along with Pain and Wonder came Chris Hamer and Keith P Rein of Urbnpop.com and Pisforpenis.com. These guys are all awesome artists and I was able to buy some great stuff from them. Links are at the end of the article and are all NSFW

I was really happy that Dave had sent me to Mikes portfolio because I was able to see that hes a comics fan and that his style lined up with what I wanted. As soon as I saw that Mike had a B.P.R.D custom tattoo gun I knew I’d made the right choice. And on top of that I was able to get one of his bad ass, fucked up Muppet prints. Along with that I picked up a custom pin-up girl bottle opener from Keith.

I’d sent Mike a link to the design I wanted and he did a perfect rendition of it with a bit of his style mixed in, it was exactly what I wanted. I got a the wrench because I am a huge Edward Abbey fan and one of my favorite books of his is The Monkey Wrench Gang.

Getting your foot tattooed is one of the more painful places and luckily I could talk Battle Star Galactica and Hell Boy with Mike so I could be distracted and along with that Terra from Iris Piercing in SLC was there keeping me entertained so that I barely felt it.

If you’re looking to check out something you usually don’t see in SLC and would like to check out some very awesome art from around the country get yourself down to the SLC Tattoo Convention, it runs through Sunday.

Links:

Mike Groves – Pain and Wonder Tattoo – poopbird.com

Dave Styer – Geekleetist.com – Etsy

Keith P Rein – ThePisforPenis.com – IndiesArt page

Chris Hamer – urbnpop.com – Etsy

Terra – Irispiercing.com

You can also find all these guys on Tumblr so make sure to check out their awesome art.