Illustrators with Ink: Tuesday Bassen

I love tat­toos and have sev­er­al of them. They’re anoth­er form of illus­tra­tion — except these are per­ma­nent­ly etched into your skin! And, whether or not you have any of your own, I think most of us agree that they (gen­er­al­ly) look pret­ty neat. So why not show ’em off? Let’s check out the tat­toos of the tal­ent­ed and pro­lif­ic illus­tra­tor, Tues­day Bassen!

Your name: Tues­day Bassen
Web­site: tuesdaybassen.com
How many tat­toos do you have? 7
Do you have a favorite? If so, which one? The tiger by Mike Adams!
Where did you get your work done? (Place and artists if applic­a­ble) Leviti­cus Tat­too (Min­neapo­lis), Nash Hogan at Hand of Glo­ry (Brook­lyn), Reuben Col­ly­more in his kitchen (NYC), and Mike Adams at Hold It Down (Rich­mond).
Is there any mean­ing behind any of your tat­toos? Any sto­ries (fun­ny or sad): They all have some sig­nif­i­cance, but were most­ly aes­thet­i­cal­ly dri­ven. I have an eye friend­ship tat­too that I drew, a Shel Sil­ver­stein draw­ing, Nan­cy by Ernie Bush­miller, the Utz girl, a tiger, a kew­pie, and a knife.
Do you see a con­nec­tion between the type of tat­toos you have and your illus­tra­tive work? Absolute­ly! I hope that my work is an exten­sion of myself and I think of my tat­toos as the same.

Full sleeves are great, but I enjoy see­ing these small­er tat­toos. Their black ink is sim­i­lar to the bold out­lines that Tues­day uses in her illustrations.

Thanks, Tues­day!

Here’s a cou­ple of her illus­tra­tions, for context: