Tristan Fitch, 40, was flipping through an archeology book when he came across an image that spoke to him and he knew instantly that he wanted it tattooed on him.
Something “clicked” when he saw the griffin, a mythical creature with the body of lion and an eagle’s head and wings. He later discovered, after having it tattooed on his arm, that the image was a representation of a tattoo archeologists discovered on a Shaman found in Mongolia.
The Shaman had been preserved in an avalanche and her skin was still intact, covered in primitive tattoos. Fitch says the revelation strengthened its appeal because of its connotations of “strength and adventure.”
Fitch, a painter and sculptor, got his first tattoo when he was 17. Very few of his friends in his hometown in Georgia then had them. It was, he says, “different” to have a tattoo at that time. The first one is on his hip and he says that he “forgets” he has it and it’s become more like a “birth mark.”
He designed the two tattoos on his arm himself. One is a symbol that features in his paintings, it represents “forward movement” and he gave it a prominent position because of the importance it holds for him.
On Fitch’s other arm is his “representation of my spirit.” The original image – an abstract motif that looks like a highly stylized floating angel – was the result of a line drawing that he did without taking his pen off the paper.
Then there’s the gecko that rests on Fitch’s ankle. It’s his “tacky” tattoo, which he had done in Hawaii. But he doesn’t want it removed because it reminds him of a happy time in his life.
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