Boston Tattoo Convention 2021

Within the Hynes Convention, located in Boston Massachusetts, houses a wonderful world of the culture of inked based body art. But that was not where the expression stops.

For being a first-time convention goer, especially paired with a great clothing booth, Valley Life Apparel, I sat behind unsure of what to expect. And in the end, I was ashamed at the fact that I've never attended one before!

In the span of the three-day event of The Boston Tattoo Con, there was never a dull moment. From clothing to tattoo gun machines, grooming booths, personal relaxation enhancing items, an active cafeteria, painting booths, piercing sections- to say the least they had everything to occupy three straight days* of entertainment.

Leaving without new ink in your skin kelp like a sin, I personally came in with one and left with four.

The entire venue showcased the depths of artists through their physical art, merchandise, stickers, booth appearance, physicals books containing sketches, photos, mini paints, stencils, smart devices displaying their digital catalog and more. These were intriguing as I was able to grab a few sentences with the body artist. And if I wasn't able to at least I could see how their creative minds worked by paying attention to their portfolio’s depth, variety, specialty and details of their accomplished canvases. The attention-grabbing templates/small hand art that was spread on their front tables and standing among vertical stands grabbed the eye. (This was rather close to October, the theme leaned more towards a fall/Halloween theme.)

Local artist and artist from places like Chicago and vendors from Florida made the journey to display their talents and value to the prolific city of Boston.

As a director of photography my main job is embezzled in making sure whatever my lens captures has substance. It has to convey a message. Within this environment, wherever you would look, any sections of the grounds you would arrive to, become fascinated by, there were characteristics or items of interest. The friendly convention goers were nothing less than proud of flowing with the opportunities given to them. The artist and client alike highly displayed the mutual work/after product, encouraging me, the camera man, to film the main reason why people walk, drive or fly in to splurge for a weekend.

The opening day, Friday, fed a baiting line to the mass of attenders. Some of who attended the entire weekend. Others who were one day flies. The sparking ambiance was filled with nothing but conversation, laughter, compliments, exchanging (showing of) body art for comparison and ink artist review. The amount of diligence, detail, variety, message or symbolisms you could detect from the imprint of ink alone against the subjects’ flesh told stories of self-expression. The best part was to engage in the persons reason/own message behind the purpose of their tattoos. Almost every and anyone who visit our booth, Valley Life Apparel, came with a bag of stories that were so capturing that they would unconsciously stick around to talk more.

Our booth was equipped with a small screen and a Nintendo Switch console with a spread of games. The challenge was: Battle a team member for 10% off of your purchase. The crowd loved the show, the players loved the competition, the buyers loved the money saved. This carried on, intensifying on Saturday (the longest day), drawing more and more to peck our brains, but our products and take a swing at a selected/comparable level opponent.

Sunday, the day to say farewell, did not slack on energy. The entirety of the weekend was a hustle and bustle of vendors working till the last minute. Only to pack up, bid each other safe travels with the hopefulness of seeing them at the next convention.

But my explanation does nothing of value. Please watch the video and see for yourself a glimpse of only a peak into the entirety of this amazing weekend/artist getaway!