Mentors and apprentices make their mark in the 'Ink Master' tattoo contest when they put their clients and each other first.
Which is more manipulative, reality TV or cable news? I've made my choice. I'm binge-watching a decade of "Ink Master." Don't judge.
"Ink Master" is a tattoo competition. A dozen or so tattoo artists are thrown into a Brooklyn loft (or more likely a New Jersey film studio that looks like a Brooklyn loft). The undercard to this competition is a timed challenge to test tattoo technique. I enjoy when the artists are assigned an unusual medium—a pig carcass, a wall, a scrap heap, a steel plate, a staple gun, a half-ton of candy. Next, they get a live client or "canvas" and a deadline assignment to tattoo a specific subject in a specific style. You will not believe how many different ways you can draw a skull. But this is reality TV, and the main event is a ritual hazing. Judges give a critique that sends one of the contestants home.
I've gone this long in my life without adding a tattoo to my permanent record. My hours spent on parlor games have not convinced me to change. For one, everything in my life is tentative. If no tattoo seems to satisfy the judges, I would probably could not live with flaws that stare back at me day after day. Also, "Ink Master" does not give me a fondness for tattoo artists. The competitors certainly are trash-talk masters. There's so much bleeped-out sniping in each episode that I feel tats are less of an old maritime art form and more like "Moby-Dick" without Moby. But mostly, I'm too sqeamish to think ink. Whenever needles appear in close-up, I close my eyes.
But decorum and nausea aside, there are life lessons to be learned from watching others make their mark. I've scratched out a few.
