It's Not Just a Tattoo, It's Art

Like their work, Jon Elliot and Ken Adams have been a permanent fixture in the tattoo world for nearly two decades.

Together, the pair owns and operates  in West Hartford, an award winning tattoo and piercing shop that first opened its doors back in 1995 and has grown not only in popularity but also in size. GMS now boasts seven tattoo artists who specialize in a wide range of styles of the centuries old craft.

Elliot, a Middlefield resident, and Adams, who lives in New Britain, recently opened the Green Man Tattoo art exhibit at the Charter Oak Cultural Center in Hartford, a gallery of about 300 images that highlight the history of tattooing.

Patch recently sat down with Elliot and Adams to talk about Green Man's beginnings, tattooing's popularity and the art of it all.

Patch: How did you get your start as a tattoo artist?

Jon Elliot: I was getting tattooed and I was just fascinated by the whole art form of it, the permanence of it is what really intrigued me, making a commitment to getting something for the rest of your life that is really kind of intriguing. Kenny and I were working together at a leather goods store, Western Boot and Clothing in West Hartford Center and one night we went and got tattooed again after work and we were just talking about tattoos, talking about tattoos all the time at work and we were just like ‘Ya know we ought to try it.' Kenny had an art background and I said 'Why don’t we get some equipment and try something out?'

Then I ordered some equipment and started messing around with it. The first tattoo I ever did is on Kim (Jon's wife). She’s got an ankle band of holly leaves. Still to this day, out of all of the tattoos I’ve done on her a lot of people will be like ‘I really like that on her ankle’ and it’s the first tattoo I ever did, is on her.

Then Kenny and I were like let’s just go for it, let’s open up a shop. It was just a little two man shop. Every few years it would just get busier. It just grows because every tattoo that leaves here is an advertisement. So if everybody that leaves with a tattoo brings a friend or two friends back it just multiplies. That was 20 years ago.

Patch: Where’d the name Green Man come from?

Elliot: The picture we decided to use, that’s a Davinci carving. It’s from the 17^th century. There was a Green Man face hanging on the wall in the room that we used to work in so then we were trying to figure out what are we going to call the shop. Green Man is a woods deity, a protector. It’s sort of an old folklore, sort of a mythology. It’s more than just a name.

Patch: What's it like to work in a tattoo shop?

Elliot: The personal relationships you get with your clients is amazing. You find out everything about them, what they do for work, their kids, they’re married, not married.

Ken Adams:  Sometimes it’s even deeper than that because when people are under stress they just [open up].

Elliot: Every day is different, without a doubt. Every tattoo is different.

Patch: What’s the most popular tattoo?

Elliot: Writing is really huge right now. The younger generation, they’re getting quotes, they’re getting words. I’d say that’s probably the biggest thing right now and a lot of it’s first timers. We do try to talk people out of names, not their kids names or grandma or grandpa type of thing, but their girlfriend or boyfriend. But if they want to get it they can get it. If things don’t work out we’ll cover it up.

Adams: Jesus. Any kind of religious tattoos, crosses. A lot of it depends on your reputation as a shop. We’re a pretty varied shop, everyone does all kind of different styles.  It’s very rare that someone comes in and there’s something we can’t do, something we can’t create in an idea that would work in a tattoo for you.

Elliot: For men, the arm tattoos are probably the most popular. I'd say the number one [overall] tattoo spot is the ribs. 

Patch: What's the pain like?

Elliot: Very annoying.

Adams: It's like taking a shower with a sunburn.

Patch: How long does the average tattoo take to complete?

Elliot: It can be anywhere from ten minutes to 40-50 hours. You’re talking over a six month period, over a year. Some people it’ll go on for a couple of years for a real big project. It’s a good week to two weeks to heal a tattoo anyway, so your
skin’s gotta get back to normal and you don’t want to be working on something
you just worked on a week before. It takes time to heal and you can maybe work
a different part.

Patch: How did Green Man Tattoo get involved with the Charter Oak Cultural Center?

Adams: They had put a call out to all the [tattoo] shops in the area. Nobody else responded. We’ve always wanted to be more professional and kind of get out of that sort of stereotypical 60's and 70’s tattoo shop idea of sort of like just a bunch of gruff… it is an art form and we don’t do it because we want to be social outcasts, we do it because we love the art form. We thought this would be a great way to showcase the shop and tattooing in general.

We’re really pleased with the way it came out. It’s very much from a historical point of view. The history of tattooing from basically from the dawn of time into the American tattooing idea, so how it sort of progressed from man first falling down on a charred stick and poking himself and saying ‘Wow, I have a tattoo,’ to basically today’s tattooing and how it falls into art forms here in the U.S.

Elliot: The application of it hasn’t really changed. We’re still using the same kind of machines we were using in the 20s. There’s no put your arm in a machine and it’ll come out with a tattoo on it. I don’t think that’ll ever happen. That’s one thing I think we’ve got going for this industry, there’s really only one kind of way of getting’ this done.

Patch: What do you hope visitors take away from the gallery?

Adams: If you're interested in tattooing it would definitely be something nice to see, such an array of image and art form. But, if you're not necessarily interested in tattooing or just curious about it, it would raise your awareness to what tattooing is about and how it's been with us for a long time.

Elliot: It might not make you say 'Hey, I want to get a tattoo' but it might make you understand why other people get a tattoo, 'cause it isn't for everybody.

Adams: What we've tried to do is we've tried to take out the social stigmatism that's attached to tattooing, like 'Oh my god, my mother would kick me out of the house.' It's there for you to formulate your own opinion. Hopefully you'll walk away saying like 'Well, I still don't want one but it's actually a nice art form.'

Patch: How do you handle the success of Green Man Tattoo?

Adams: We're still kind of amazed. Sometimes I'm a little embarassed. We're regular [guys], we're loud in our environment.

Elliot: I don't really think about that, we just go to work every day.

Adams: I think Jon and I, because we're very like minded in a lot of ways we want this shop to be like a shop we would want to go into. We live here, this is how we make our living, this is where we spend most of our time. We want to be comfortable here, we want to make other people comfortable here. It's just about the experience.

To this day, we get done tattooing and I know Jon does it and I do it, we get done and we look at and we still get goosebumps. We're like 'Oh my god, I can't believe I just did this, this is so awesome.' I'm still amazed at tattooing.

Elliot: Because you get a tattoo from somebody they'll remember that guy or girl the rest of your life and it might only be an hour or two you spent with them.

Patch: Do you have a favorite tattoo?

Adams: There's a lot that you like.

Elliot: There's a lot of favorites. I think your favorite one has still got to be done.

The Green Man Tattoo art exhibit runs through Friday, Feb. 24. The gallery is FREE and open to the public. Hours and additional information can be found on the Charter Oak Cultural Center's website or by calling 860-249-1207.