Bang Bang: My Life in Ink
Language: English
Pages: 240
ISBN: 0062382225
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
The celebrity tattoo artist takes fans on a tour through his life and art, combining captivating vignettes and stories with more than one hundred color photos.
Justin Bieber, Katy Perry, Rita Ora, Cara Delevingne, Rihanna, and many more of the hottest celebrities in the world have been seen on the red carpet, on concert stages, and in magazine spreads wearing stunning ink created by Keith “Bang Bang” McCurdy, the most in-demand tattoo artist in the entertainment world. Bang Bang’s work has taken him across the country and around the globe, to any and every locale a celebrity client may request. From Rihanna’s controversial gun tattoos, to inking Justin Bieber at 40,000 feet—a record—each of Bang Bang’s tattoos comes with its own epic story. Now, this creative genius invites readers along on his adventures, sharing amazing tales from his life and career.
Named for the duel guns tattooed on his neck, Bang Bang began his career in his mom’s tiny Delaware kitchen. Self-taught, he practiced with a kit from an art store before eventually moving to New York. Over the past decade, Bang Bang’s talent and vision propelled his rise into the spotlight, and today, his fresh, accessible aesthetic draws men and women, tattoo vets and novices alike eager to experience his ultra-fluid and realistic designs created with the finest needles and inks. Bang Bang’s visual style transcends the clichés of the tattoo world; he creates a truly different form of art.
Filled with engaging personal stories and striking photographs that bring his bold, vibrant designs into detail, Bang Bang is a must-have for Bang Bang fans and tattoo lovers everywhere.
people decide on a tattoo artist today is the same way they decided a hundred years ago and the way they’ll decide a hundred years from now: word of mouth. And press is just another (albeit more far-reaching) kind of word of mouth. But as great as the mainstream media has been for my business, the thing that kicked it into high gear was social media. Social media changed the way people communicate. What an influential blogger in London says reaches Istanbul, Brooklyn, and Nova Scotia
followers. I post all our artists’ work on the @BangBangNYC account, so we began to gain followers steadily. Slowly, at first. But then someone like La La Anthony posts a photo of the two of you hanging out and suddenly you have thousands more followers and the front desk at the studio can’t keep up with the requests rolling in. Because believe me, someone like La La or Rihanna or Justin Bieber is showing your work to a lot more people than my cousins ever managed to. Hundreds of millions more.
Thierry Henry was when he walked into the store. Thierry and his girlfriend, Andrea Rajacic, had loved Swizz Beatz’s tattoos, which led Andrea to check us out on Swizzy’s referral. Edward remembered her from all his years at The Mercer, where she and Thierry were regulars. Ed found me in the back of the store and told me some big soccer player was looking to get tattooed. I like American football, not European, so I had no idea that Thierry was basically the Michael Jordan of the rest of the
it. “I was shocked at first—I had a physical reaction because my mind was trying to process it and figure out how it was possible. It was amazing,” she says. Besides being one of my oldest friends (albeit with a twenty-year gap), Kristi is unique because she’s the only traditional artist here. Well, was the only traditional artist here. As her style developed and our store became more known as a place for realism, unique designs, and a newer sort of tattooing style, our clientele tended to be
his mom’s kitchen in Delaware, but over the past decade his visual style has transcended the tattoo world, proving that ink isn’t just a statement, it’s high fashion. Going beneath the ink, Bang Bang shares the stories behind his work for major celebrities, star athletes, and everyday people. Filled with hundreds of striking photographs that bring his bold, vibrant designs into detail, Bang Bang: My Life in Ink tracks Bang Bang’s journey to the top, showing that the best ink is always much more