Your Tattooist
Peter Jamieson Sinclair (aka Pete Tattoo) has been involved in the Tattoo Industry for the last 10 years, and has been an artist since he was 7. Born in 1964, that makes for 34 years of experience in art. Self taught with only O and A levels in the subject as any academic qualification, he got into tattooing because he couldn’t sell his paintings.

As most of his work was fine art reproduction ( he actually wanted to be a fine art forger!) he quickly realised that in the world of 2-up 2-down matchbox sized Barrat homes, there was very little room to hang a 6ft canvas of St John The Baptist or The Crucifixion, over the modern home owners dining table and if there were, they certainly weren’t prepared to pay the asking price (£3000) in order for him to maintain his chosen path as an artist. Despite his ability to recreate a Caravaggio or a Michelangelo, a de la Tour or a Rembrandt, the going was too tough and he got a real job. Which he hated. So he left.

He approached many studios with the usual knockbacks; some were openly hostile, others just experts in bovine eschatology. Some places said they would teach him and then never called back, one even wanted £60,000 to compensate for the business he would lose when Pete had done his apprenticeship! Alan Hale wanted to give him a place but simply didn’t have the work, having 2 people working with him already and at Alan’s first shop, space was a factor. He wished Pete all the best. He still does Pete’s tattoos and they still speak regularly.
Pete managed to get an apprenticeship (finally) with Alan Evans at Forest Body Art in the Forest of Dean. After seeing Pete’s portfolio, Alan wanted to know what on earth he wanted a career in tattooing for, but took him on regardless. At the time Pete was a tattoo virgin – not a mark on him. Three months down the line and Pete had decided that whilst he and Alan got on, he needed somewhere closer to home if he was going to make a go of this.

Step forward Doc Jones at Bodycraft, Gloucester. Doc was Old School, from the good old days of Les, Danny and Rusty Skuse, George Bone, Doc Graham of Cardiff (his old partner) and Mickey Sharpz. Allegedly both Lal Hardy and Darren Stares worked for Doc for a good while. Pete often wondered if they found the “Old Man” as trying as he often did; “ You had to be a mind reader really. Doc was so full on. He changed his mind more often than I don’t know what. He was mental, quite frankly. But I can never say that we didn’t have a laugh coz we did! We once went buying jewellery for Doc’s new venture, in Hockley. When we came back to the car, we had been clamped. £75-00 to get it sorted. He was for ripping the thing off the wheel and wrapping it round the clampers head. I looked at the car, his other half’s Fiesta, and asked him how much the car was worth and would she get the hump if we just left it. Lucky for both of us, he decided she would really be very upset and we would get more grief than either of us could handle if we came back with pockets full of jewellery and no car. So we, that is, I, paid a 30 stone sweaty, dirty pig-ignorant dungheap of a man. And 75 miles later, 8 miles from home, we hit a flood. Right up to and over the door sills, a wave of floodwater the likes of which has not been seen since Moses pushed the pedestrian button on the shores of the Red Sea. Then the car stalled. Sat there like Laurel and Hardy. We laughed about it later but at the time it was just another nail in that days coffin.”

It was too much in the end. Financial difficulties, a failing relationship, and a heavy workload finally took their toll and Pete left, swearing never, ever, ever would he take up tattooing if it were the last career on earth and his life depended on it. So he went back to his art.
A German Art Restorer was good enough to act as an agent and things picked up; an Irish collector commissioned some copies of obscure works and he managed to pay his rent, feed himself etc. At the time he remained sanguine about the whole thing; “I managed to survive in the knowledge that rent and food were as much as any artist could hope for. It was more than Van Gogh managed!” Then BSE hit, quickly followed by Foot and Mouth. So what? “Well the thing was, my agent worked the art fairs, which were all held on agricultural land. All the fiars got cancelled because of the quarantines. Who ever heard of an artist suffering from the knock on effects of Foot and Mouth? Couldn’t believe it.”

By this time, he didn’t actually know how not to be a tattooist. It was Alan Hale who got him motivated again. At that time, a tattooist in Birmingham needed someone to work for them. He called Pete, offered him a place and that was that. Or so Pete thought. He is hesitant to speak about this experience other than;”Trust nobody and never lend money to anyone. No exceptions”.
A brief stint in Blackpool put him off working the traditional seaside tattoo haunts (“too many drunks and way too many tourists”) and he went to work for Studio 81 in Preston. Of this he says;”I have never met anyone who was so in love with their job than Dave (The Buddah) Ashton. He really does love what he does and it made a change to work with someone who wasn’t preoccupied with being a “cool” tattooist.”

After doing some appearances here and there, Tattoo Carnival is his first proprietry shop, despite some setting up problems with an investor, and it would appear to be here to stay. “Well, people seem to like the service they get here. We’re cordial, we never laugh at the usual requests people laugh at. Cleveleys is just north of Blackpool and there is a big transgender community up here. Anybody can come to us and not feel threatened or ridiculed in any way. We provide a pain-free method of tattooing, free of charge, and the healing cream comes as part of the service as well. I rarely do anything off the wall as it’s mostly all freehand work, although if tribal became as unpopular as the Crazy Frog, I wouldn’t shed a tear! But then it’s not for me to decide what people should and shouldn’t have. The only thing I don’t tattoo is football badges and swastikas – because I loath the former with a passion and swastikas? If you can’t work that out then you should have a carer looking after you”.

Favourite Movies :- The Third Man
Favourite Artist :- Caravaggio
Favourite Book :- Nineteen Eighty Four
Favourite Food :- Anything dead
Greatest influence :- My wife
Pet Hate :- Reality TV, The Crazy Frog, People who lie (“Can’t I have more than three?”) People who want nothing but lettering!
Favourite Band :- Morphine
Ultimate Wish :- To be left alone in peace and quiet, to draw, for all politicians to be tied upside down to public urinals and for people to take more time choosing a tattoo than they do choosing a pizza.
Favourite Pastime :- Tattooing Dragons, Martial arts lessons with Smudge, Riding horses, Beer , Meat and Fire.
Favourite Saying :- “There’s good eating on one o’ them!”