“Tattooing has been at the center of my activity for many years now and looking back at it, it seems that I have always tried to link it with other activities. I am not sure if it’s a necessity to celebrate tattooing as art, which is a topic I am not interested in, but there has always been a feeling of missing something while tattooing people, transforming them, and then just letting them go. 

I have started to perceive my clients like the characters in my paintings, but instead of portraying them with paint, I use photography. I add elements to it, I change the perspective, and I create new artwork.

The question is how to include tattooing in the bigger picture of art creation. How do I bond tattooing with the rest of my art? 

It has felt for too long like a separate practice, following in parallel with the other art activities. 

This residency and the previous book “How to forget about a song” are a celebration of a new chapter on my relationship with marking bodies and their portraiture.

This residency at Varsi helped me to bring to reality a new chapter of my tattooing-related art. it was an idea lying there silent for a long time, it manifested itself sometime but never tangibly. 

It feels like I have solved the riddle. All is one finally.”

Michele Servadio

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