Renee's Feathered Serpent

I was walking down 31st Street in Manhattan when a woman walked by with a hummingbird and flower on her left shoulder. I turned back to talk to her and I was stunned to see a bright colorful tattoo spanning the top of her back> I called after her and had a nice chat.<br /><br />To my delight, Renee was my familiar with the site, as her artist, <a href="http://1228tattoo.blogspot.com/">Joy Rumore</a>, had just been featured on Tattoosday <a href="http://tattoosday.blogspot.com/2010/06/kats-mucha-tattoo-with-nod-to-lemony.html">here</a>. Taking a photo of the tattoo in question was not possible due to the presence of clothing covering sections of it, but I gave Renee my card and asked her to keep in touch. However, after a few messages on Twitter, not only did I have the link to photos of the tattoo from the artist's blog, I also had an open dialogue with Renee, who explained the tattoo for me.<br /><br />As Joy says on her original post <a href="http://1228tattoo.blogspot.com/2010/01/all-hail-mighty-kukulcan.html">here</a>, "All hail the mighty <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kukulkan">Kukulcan</a>!":<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2BbB7x_7kjfNukLVCWdC_-N9Tq5_Ot-7msbPtqtmOuIyF26CbeAWQGZKqh5RfqckZcg8Sl517BgjlsND30BsY8S6UQOsAJBuS5JpYWQGZvM453UKfYacUCEPnqwexHUzfumQek4og/s1600/Kukulcan+1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="267" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2BbB7x_7kjfNukLVCWdC_-N9Tq5_Ot-7msbPtqtmOuIyF26CbeAWQGZKqh5RfqckZcg8Sl517BgjlsND30BsY8S6UQOsAJBuS5JpYWQGZvM453UKfYacUCEPnqwexHUzfumQek4og/s400/Kukulcan+1.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaK9qii6VLUnRk2B5628LA06d9BD85DNFZwKqBqYdXWjtqIOuk_fSo880Ad5-NCVGPFQRqt_147VWjvCxGL9eLxehWCrHK6tJi7f0vWBdD6Nws0bX-x3DaZaJTjDbMhvcK-erIhqJy/s1600/Kukulcan+4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaK9qii6VLUnRk2B5628LA06d9BD85DNFZwKqBqYdXWjtqIOuk_fSo880Ad5-NCVGPFQRqt_147VWjvCxGL9eLxehWCrHK6tJi7f0vWBdD6Nws0bX-x3DaZaJTjDbMhvcK-erIhqJy/s400/Kukulcan+4.jpg" width="267" /></a></div><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJYhz3PjZbDsJ7uJX-JQQPt8c7d1U2EInP2vkPdXOtzDOQvYXSPVZJgz5m30fgf6T-NORJsJsSa8g7OKkFeBYkRUdKu2Mil3OjoUf5lHF155Qj_LiqVptzuOC909_kPnzTkL2hslJ9/s1600/Kukulcan+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJYhz3PjZbDsJ7uJX-JQQPt8c7d1U2EInP2vkPdXOtzDOQvYXSPVZJgz5m30fgf6T-NORJsJsSa8g7OKkFeBYkRUdKu2Mil3OjoUf5lHF155Qj_LiqVptzuOC909_kPnzTkL2hslJ9/s400/Kukulcan+2.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwyMrFEEm3VrwYCL8-We-mtml6uFlkfJioPGSinliMrgTLsnBsImLru0pRZFTqCm0h7EtPkdGnxF9ZXSnJsiHzWttfzAQvwpdI066unozT-2kCHwHcZ38FvR-whyphenhyphenX1eD6T_DBGBF7R/s1600/Kukulcan+3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwyMrFEEm3VrwYCL8-We-mtml6uFlkfJioPGSinliMrgTLsnBsImLru0pRZFTqCm0h7EtPkdGnxF9ZXSnJsiHzWttfzAQvwpdI066unozT-2kCHwHcZ38FvR-whyphenhyphenX1eD6T_DBGBF7R/s400/Kukulcan+3.jpg" width="296" /></a></div><br /><br />I asked Renee to elaborate on why she got this incredible tattoo across her back. I'll let her words speak for themselves:<br /><blockquote><br />"I got this feathered serpent tattoo when I advanced to candicacy in my doctoral program where I study <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aztec">Aztec</a> art. I think we did it over three or four 90-minute sessions ... The feathered serpent was an old <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mesoamerica">Mesoamerican</a> god, a version of which dates back to the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olmec">Olmecs</a> (about 400 BCE) and is seen at a number of Mexican sites like <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teotihuacan">Teotihuacan</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chichen_Itza">Chichen Itza</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tula,_Hidalgo">Tula</a>, and the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Templo_Mayor">Templo Mayor</a> in <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexico_City">Mexico City</a>. The Aztecs called him <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quetzalcoatl">Quetzalcoatl</a> which translates from <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nahuatl">Nahuatl</a> (their spoken language) into bird-snake. Joy refers to him on her blog as Kukulcan, which is the version that is seen at Chichen Itza in the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yucat%C3%A1n">Yucatán</a>.<br /><br />I wanted a tattoo of a feathered serpent because he so relevant to the Aztecs and they took great care in carving beautiful stone images of the animal.  I also knew of Joy's penchant for amazing feather work, and I knew this would be a good match.  I brought Joy a series of images, one from a mural at Teotihuacan, one from a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixtec">Mixtec</a> manuscript and another of an Aztec stone carving of a feathered serpent.  She used those and her knowledge of imagery from the Yucatan to create a more composite image of the god."</blockquote> A huge thanks to Renee and to Joy at <a href="http://www.1228tattoo.com/">Twelve 28 Tattoo</a> for their cooperation in making this post possible!

Renee's Feathered Serpent

I was walking down 31st Street in Manhattan when a woman walked by with a hummingbird and flower on her left shoulder. I turned back to talk...

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