Courtney Love x Parliament Tattoo Charity Auction

Dani is an artist based in North London, originally from Surrey. She studied art whilst in school and decided to seek out a tattoo apprenticeship before finishing her A levels. Her primary medium or work is tattooing and has been doing this full time since 2018. A principal theme in Dani’s work is generally macabre with darker themes. Whilst under the broad umbrella of ‘black work’ it has more aspects of realism compared to more traditional black work. She tends to work on a smaller scale with a high concentration of details, often including a harsher bold outline to juxtapose the fine details within the piece. This serves as a tool to improve the longevity of the tattoo whilst also being an aesthetically pleasing contrast. The main early influences of Danis work have been H.R Giger, Frank Frazetta, Virgil Finlay and Lucian Freud. 

The piece has been inspired by the song Loaded. 

‘That's the crown that you get for falling down’

The idea of receiving attention relating to a downfall seemed akin to the irony of the Mary Magdalene/ Jesus trope, which shows itself several times throughout the song, this led to the artist including the crown of thorns hovering above the head, just out of reach. Potentially only a mirage.

‘Hey baby, let me look in your eyes

I see you standing in a weird red light’

The skeleton facing away was a deliberate choice to dehumanise and objectify the fundamentals of the bare figure before you. The ‘red light’ feels like a clear reference to the red light district, or perhaps the danger of being both physically and emotionally vulnerable with anyone as a woman.

‘Open my scar, let out my stars

Slut me open and suck my scars’

This invokes a lot of feeling of being unshielded and in turn the power that comes with that. This also led to the decision to have the skeleton as the main object of the piece. The literal ‘bare bones’ gives the vision of being unprotected whilst also displaying contrast of the strong skeletal structure.

The main theme for the piece is raw exposure and the uncomfortable amount of accessibility this can cause when power is seemingly taken away.