It’s time for Page Two: News that might not make the front page for Tuesday March 31, 2026
Tattoo art is different from other art.
A sculptor makes a three-dimensional piece out of metal or stone.
A painter paints a two-dimensional painting on canvas.
But the metal doesn’t move on its own. And the canvas doesn’t talk back.
Page Two wanted to learn about tattoo art. So we talked to Crow, one of the three artists at the Twin Ravens Tattoo Shop in downtown Palmer.
Crow’s art journey started in middle and high school. He taught himself to draw comic book figures. Then he got into role playing games like Dungeons and Dragons. He developed skills. These skills led to a career as a free-lance illustrator.
Crow turned to tattoo art after 15 years as a free-lance illustrator.
Crow says those years as a professional artist prepared him for tattooing. It gave him a steady hand for line art. It taught him skills like cross-hatching. He learned the principles of design.
“You can be a technically good artist, but if you don’t have good design, it’s not going to turn out well,” Crow says.
Tattoo work is not just needle and ink. The artist must know how to listen. “I’m listening beyond what they’re technically saying,” Crow says. He tries to get the heart of what they want to express.
He asks lots of questions before he starts sketching. Often, he will research and look at his references. Then he brings the ideas to the client. He says that sometimes he can bring these ideas to the table and provide something better than they could have imagined themselves.
Crow’s deep listening paid off recently. A Pacific Islander wanted to honor individuals in her life. And she wanted to honor her cultural traditions. For three years, she had been trying to find an artist she could work with. She never liked the designs.
Crow is not a Pacific Islander, so he asked a lot of questions. She had images in her mind, but Crow didn’t stop there. He needed to dig deeper into what those images meant to her. After the interview, he did his research. Then he sketched out a design. She liked what she saw.
You might say that the conversation with the client is part of the art. That’s even true when the client is on the table. The conversation continues. But it’s not like sitting down across from someone at a coffeeshop.
Crow will sometimes interrupt himself mid-sentence. The conversation might be going on and then he gets to a part that’s a little more difficult. He might say, “just a second” and there’ll be dead air while he focuses on the work.
He might lose the conversational thread, but he’ll get it back to it.
There are tattoos Crow won’t do. He won’t work on any part of the body that a swimming suit would cover. And he says he has the right to refuse a tattoo that “skirts a line that he’s not comfortable with. He was reluctant to get specific. He would rather talk to the client and understand their motives before dictating his limits.
Twin Rivers Tattoo is at 111 W. Elmwood Avenue. Three artists work there. You can see samples of their work at twinravenstattooshop.com
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This Page Two article was reported by David Cheezem and produced by yours truly, Lee Henrikson. If you have an idea for a Page 2 topic, please email us at page2@radiofreepalmer.org.
That’s it for today and the news on Page Two on Tuesday March 31, 2026.