title: Tattooist-customer relationships in a diversified environment of professional tattooists and 'scratchers'.
abstract: The world of tattooing and body art has never been like it is today. This chapter seeks to investigate this situation through the lens of tattooing. One of the areas in which tattooing has changed is the relationship between the tattoo artist and his or her clients. Whereas being a tattoo artist used to be impersonal and very much just a job like any other, it has transformed tremendously today. The cause of this and, even more so, what exactly has changed are what this chapter will seek to shed light on. First of all, the format of the shops and how the art is done have changed, which allows for much greater flexibility from the perspective of the artist. Second, from the perspective of the client/customer, a transformation has also occurred, in some part thanks to developments such as the internet and other social/communication media, which give the client much more room and opportunity to discover and research tattoos. However, most importantly, this chapter seeks to map out a change in discourse when it comes to the relationship between the client and the tattoo artist and to explain how it has changed into a relationship based on mutual and reciprocated communication as well as focussed on making a product/piece of art that both can be satisfied with.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Sociology, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark.
authors.forename: Mads Wedel
authors.initials: MW
authors.lastname: Kristensen
mesh_terms: D003256:Community Participation; D003258:Consumer Behavior; D006801:Humans; D007398:Interpersonal Relations; D013653:Tattooing / Q000523:psychology