Saturday, October 23, 2010

Bluebird Tattoo










I recently had the opportunity to illustrate a tattoo for my friend and fellow designer Jeremy Jones based on the Charles Bukowski poem "Bluebird". This was an awesome project to work on! Jeremy did an amazing job researching Bukowski's work and pulling out elements from the poem he wanted me to depict. Once the illustration was completed, it was amazingly reproduced with some accent color by tattoo artist Stanley Corona at Good Time Charlie's Tattooland in Anaheim, CA. Jeremy was cool enough to send me some progress shots as things developed, it came out beautifully.

I'm always super flattered when people enjoy my work, even more from a talented peer. Its a real privilege to create something that will be on someone's body for the rest of their life. Thanks man!

Be sure to check out Jeremy's great design work at bigbrownvan.com

More on the way, keep on truckin.

-R

Bluebird by Charles Bukowski

there's a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I'm too tough for him,
I say, stay in there, I'm not going
to let anybody see
you.
there's a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I pur whiskey on him and inhale
cigarette smoke
and the whores and the bartenders
and the grocery clerks
never know that
he's
in there.
there's a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I'm too tough for him,
I say,
stay down, do you want to mess
me up?
you want to screw up the
works?
you want to blow my book sales in
Europe?
there's a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I'm too clever, I only let him out
at night sometimes
when everybody's asleep.
I say, I know that you're there,
so don't be
sad.
then I put him back,
but he's singing a little
in there, I haven't quite let him
die
and we sleep together like
that
with our
secret pact
and it's nice enough to
make a man
weep, but I don't
weep, do
you?

2 comments:

Tartarian wolf eagle said...

DUDE! You know you did an awesome job because I saw it and I was like ahhh that reminds me perfectly of someone like bukowski or even a beat writer from the 50's. great drawing and tat and lets raise a beer to the one and only chinaski ;)

Ryan Milner said...

Thanks for the kind words man! Love your work and looking forward to your show at Phone Booth Gallery!!