Discovery and self-discovery. The new editorial by Miki Vialetto

In this issue right on the cusp between 2021 and 2022 I would like to showcase two fascinating women who each in her own way represents the feminine side of tattoo and, in a certain sense, the times in which we live.

Our cover girl is Jessica Wild, a well-known face and an extremely successful tattoo model who with the publication of her book “Going Wilde” has thrown her hat into the ring in the debate on how the virtual and fake so often eclipse the real.

Then you will find the article with our interview with Daria Pirojenco, a Moscow-based tattooist whose work shows what a woman can achieve in her home country, an example to spur others on to follow their ambitions and throw themselves into the process heart and soul. What most impressed me was her energy and enthusiasm, increasingly rare these days with so many tattoo artists, their fire fading, unwilling to challenge the status quo. Nothing could be further from the truth with FIBS who rather than rest on his laurels in Puerto Rico hit the accelerator and set off to gain experience and rolled up outside Guru Tattoo in San Diego, his style developing and maturing over the years.

Just like Oscar Akermo who left Stockholm to settle in New York, an electrifying city where he finds stimulus and opportunity, a place where he can encounter clients from all over the world and all their different requests which require him to produce his best in a style where classical art meets science fiction.

This desire to push himself further in tattoo, to dare to try new forms, was what led Oliver Macintosh to get into Japanese, or as he says himself, let Japanese get into him, making him one of the most interesting tattooists in terms of the western interpretation of certain Japanese themes.

And Japanese is the great love which led Pino Cafaro to open his White Fox Gallery where apart from tattooing with his trusty crew he also created his major collection of Japanese prints, paintings and artwork.

When you set foot in his shop you can feel the passion, his tangible dedication to an art and world, the fruit of his own personal quest, a quest which I believe nobody should ever abandon.