A talented 36-year-old tattoo artist, Anne-Marie recently left her native Quebec for Western Canada. In the calm of Vancouver Island, at Second Street Tattoo, she perpetuates a typical West Coast school of custom tattooing.
You left Quebec where you grew up to settle in Western Canada, especially after an experience on a small island. Can you tell us about this need for freedom?
I didn't really want to settle down in one place. I would go from one guest spot to another, going to conventions all over the country. I lived in my van on the road. But after spending the winter in Oregon, I had an intense desire to live somewhere with heat and especially with access to hot water! An opportunity arose on the small island of Quadra, on the northern part of Vancouver Island. It's a pretty remote place (it takes two ferries and a 4 hour drive from the city of Vancouver). I settled there for a few years and opened a small private studio during the pandemic. Quadra Island is a special place. I spent some of my time hiking, snorkelling, eating oysters on the fire from the beach. Sometimes there is traffic! A pod of orcas can force the ferry to stop and let them pass. There are worse places! I left about six months ago, the current housing crisis often forces people here to uproot themselves and move quite far away. I've fallen back quite a bit though!
Is tattooing a passion or an opportunity to make a living from drawing that came along the way?
It's a mixture of both I would say. I wanted to tattoo when I was 13-14 years old before I made my first attempts when I was 16. But technically I've been drawing for much longer, as long as I can remember. It's probably my favourite part of the process. Honestly, I'm not interested in tattooing without the drawing. If I had to stick to the technical side of it, I don't think I'd be doing this job.
Did you study art?
I tried it halfway through my career because I felt my skills were plateauing, I wasn't getting any better. I thought that university would be the best way to learn but I hit a wall. Let's just say that conceptual drawing is not what I was looking for... I did two thirds of my bachelor's degree and I withdrew. I kept a certain baggage and especially a love for sculpture, ceramics, for 3D creation.
In terms of influences, can you tell us where you would situate your work?
I like a lot of West Coast Canadian illustration, from everywhere really. I think my style is part of that.
Your creations are inspired by nature and animals. Are you more of a land or sea person?
I would say land. I'm more at ease there than at sea, that's for sure. I have an unconditional love for the mountains. And then I discovered the joys of life by the sea here. I like the mixture of the two in the end. They alternate and come together.
I think there is a certain serenity in your tattoos. Is it a feeling you like to transmit to your clients?
It's funny, I think there's often a tension. But I realise that the interpretation changes from person to person. I like it, it shows that what I do speaks intimately to people, at least I hope so. And then there are also the demands of the clients, the kind of emotions they want to convey in their tattoos. But when I have carte blanche or when I use personal drawings, I give free rein to my emotion of the moment and a "window on my soul" opens up. Lately, I recognise a search for peace and calm, after the madness of the last few years.
The marvellous is also present, with distant references to fairy tales, to folklore. Do you recognise these sources of inspiration for your imagination?
Yes, it's exciting, but I rarely draw inspiration from outside stories. When I have the freedom to create a project, I try to get into a state of flow and let my choices take care of themselves. Certain things come up regularly. I've been told that it's my own folklore, my inner world, my story. Maybe in the end it is part of a collective unconscious and the two come together?
You draw a lot of animals, but recently you've also been drawing more humans, are there any particular artistic reasons for this?
Yes, to some extent, it corresponds to my development. I originally drew anthropomorphic animals and I think this shift is a continuation of that. Rather than disguising a human feeling in an animal, why not go straight to the human? It's perhaps a more mature vision. I also like the complexity of the human body. It's always a challenge and an endless source of new things to learn and improve.
Drawing old people is also a message against the dictatorship of youthism, promoted by the media and the consumer society?
Yes, that's well said! I was fed up with the unrealistic image of women - and men too, but especially women - that you find in the mainstream media and also in the world of tattooing. So I wanted to offer an alternative in which it would be possible to recognize oneself a little more. As for the question of age, that's exactly what you describe. We're all heading in the same direction and the picture our societies paint is not a happy one. I wanted to show the beauty of age, to make it less off-putting. Wrinkles are not only fun to draw but they also reflect our history, the history that is written on us. They give character to a face. We live in an extremely fast-paced society, while old age is a fact of life, due to the slowing down of the body. This is not necessarily a bad thing. So it's a bit of an ode to slowness, to a more contemplative state. At least, that's how I anticipate this stage of life!
For many tattoo artists, personal artistic activity and tattooing are inextricably linked, how is it for you?
Yes, I agree. There is a mentality in the tattoo world that you have to do more, tattoo as much as possible, draw projects all night long. You have to sacrifice everything for tattooing because that's how you become better. I don't agree with that. I think my work is best when I leave a lot of room for personal artistic exploration. I don't just strive to be technically good but also to create with "my heart" (which is the one thing that AI can't take away from us). This comes from taking a step back from my personal projects before bringing it all back into my daily work. This resource is not inexhaustible, it must be fed. For me, this comes from leaving the necessary space for my own projects.
Which artists/tattooers do you consider as key references?
The list is long but I can say that at the moment - like many in our area - Steve Moore is a great inspiration. As much for his projects as for his ethics and way of working, which are in line with my values. Rather than doing more, it's more about doing better, with sincerity, working from the heart. And James Tex is always amazing to follow. I feel like they are both a good representation of that "flavour" that I love so much about western Canadian tattooing. Jeff Gogue was a huge inspiration at the time. When I discovered his work, I realized that you could go very far with the illustrative and that it was possible to tattoo what you draw. Growing up, I loved the illustrators of the 1980's such as: Boris Vallejo, Simon Bisley, Frank Frazzeta, the Dungeons & Dragons books I used to steal from my brother when his back was turned, Norman Rockwell's illustrations. At the moment I'm loving Wylie Beckert and Jaw Cooper. I think it's interesting the kind of inspiration you get from social media. It's like being in a bath of micro-inspiration every day. You couldn't point to one particular image but each one leaves a mark. I'm also very inspired by Eastern European cultures at the moment: their traditional costumes, the rural, the countryside. Maybe it's another call to the slow, the ancient, the 'sacred'? + IG : @annemarietattoo
