Celebrity tattoo artist Scott Campbell is not used to confining himself to paper and canvases to create his art. But for a past exhibit at OHWOW Gallery in New York City, he’s gone even farther than inked skin, turning instead to ostrich eggs as the medium for his intricate designs. Titled “Noblesse Oblige,” the exhibit involves an array of mediums not often found in a tattoo parlour, including copper, graphite and uncut currency sheets. It was his ostrich egg designs that caught our eye though — a series of drawings rendered in graphite on the inside of delicate eggshells. Portraying dark images of snakes, insects and flowers, the artist contrasts his fragile medium with bold themes of birth and transformation that appear to hatch from the fragile oval structures. The title of the exhibit was taken from a French phrase that references the obligation associated with nobility. For Campbell, his reputation as a high-ranking tattoo artist is his tongue-in-cheek version of “noblesse oblige,” and so his exhibit was a chance for him to address the themes and images often associated with ink art.
