Body art

Tina Carr, practitioner of the ancient but vaguely disreputable tattoo arts, leaves her mark on a number of surprisingly straight customers who show up at Inkers, the small shop she manages on Redland Road in Rockville.

She says her clients are not just “old, white bikers,” sailors, outcasts and artists. They are businessmen, doctors, lawyers, dentists and mothers.

“Tattoos are more common nowadays than you might think,” says Mrs. Carr, who has a large tattoo that spreads across her back and shoulders.

Mrs. Carr, 40, got into the tattoo business after apprenticing at Inkers to do cosmetic tattoos, like permanent eyeliner, lip-liner and eyebrows. She still performs cosmetic tattooing, but has worked her way up to piercing and regular tattoo work.

She acknowledges that not everyone is comfortable when first coming into the tattoo parlor, with its leopard carpet and rows of tattoo art on the walls.

And Mrs. Carr has turned away some patrons, mostly younger women wanting to get tattoos of their boyfriends’ names or others wanting tattoos on their faces or hands. “We really discourage that,” she says.

Mrs. Carr started on a recent afternoon at the shop with a repeat customer, Jeannette Johnson of Silver Spring.

Mrs. Johnson, a mother of five, has four visible tattoos on her arms, chest and the back of her neck. She decided to add onto her most elaborate tattoo, which is situated on her right shoulder. That piece has two chrysanthemums, one purple and one red, tucked between flowing water.

Mrs. Carr, who sports Prada shoes and a pierced upper lip, plans to add another flower to the design on Mrs. Johnson’s arm, commonly known as a Japanese tattoo.

“There is still plenty of room for more,” Mrs. Carr says, pointing to the untouched underside of Mrs. Johnson’s arm.

Mrs. Carr begins by preparing a stencil, an ink outline of the flower, that she presses onto Mrs. Johnson’s arm. The ink from the stencil does not stain, but it does give Mrs. Carr a map for drawing the new tattoo and making sure it flows with the rest of the piece.

“You want the water going around the flowers to always be in motion,” she says, adding that Japanese tattoos often have a central focus of fluid movement within the picture. “Unless you’re doing something like an emblem, you want the tattoo to have that motion.”

She wipes some of the stencil’s lines away and draws in with a Bic pen some water currents that overlap the flower’s leaves. Satisfied with the outline, Mrs. Carr and Mrs. Johnson sit down in one of the shop’s tiny operating rooms.

Mrs. Johnson rests her arm on a sanitized chair arm and talks amicably with Mrs. Carr, who continues the conversation while snapping on black latex gloves and setting up her tattoo machine.

The machine has a long tube that feeds into the needle attachment. For the outline, the attachment has just one needle that goes up and down a thousand times a second, Mrs. Carr says.

She dabs the needle attachment in black ink and steps on the machine’s ground pedal. The needle attachment buzzes furiously as Mrs. Carr begins tracing parts of the flower. The needle attachment pierces Mrs. Johnson’s skin as it deposits the ink.

Mrs. Johnson looks away from the production, staring intently at the shop’s risque artwork. “I’m fine,” she says calmly. “It really doesn’t bother me. You definitely feel it, but everybody reacts differently” to the pain, Mrs. Johnson says.

While Mrs. Carr has had several customers pass out from the pain, few have stopped in the middle of the process and left.

“Once people tell me they’re getting one, they’re getting it,” she says.

Customers can pay $50 to $10,000 for a tattoo, depending on its size, shape, detail and design. An average-sized tattoo usually costs $225, Mrs. Carr says.

“You can go to cheaper places, but then you get a cheap tattoo,” she says.

Mrs. Carr continues to trace the flower for 45 minutes, stopping every few strokes with the needle attachment to wipe away smeared ink and apply ointment.

The ointment keeps the recently applied colors from running and softens the skin.

When the outline is finished, Mrs. Carr sprays green soap onto the flesh to wipe off excess ink. She then puts on another needle attachment, one with seven needles inside of it, for shading in the leaves and flower petals.

She colors some of the leaves and the water spraying the flower during the next hour. “Sometimes I can finish a tattoo in one sitting, but I’m going to wait for Jeannette’s arm to heal and then color it in next time,” Mrs. Carr says. She applies a bandage to the area with masking tape and has Mrs. Johnson stand to get circulation in her legs.

Mrs. Johnson says she generally keeps her “masterpieces” covered while working at the Washington Adventist Hospital. “But I love them and I like showing them off when I feel it’s appropriate,” she says.