S06.E11: Hail Mani

[thewhiteowl]

 

Religious tattoo virgins get their first ink--on their fingernails; tattooing famous works of art means the smallest errors result in failure.

 

[Eliza422]

It's a bad night when Tyler has the best tattoo of the night (imo)....

Edited September 9, 2015 by Eliza422

[phoenix780]

That was disappointing.  I should never say who I like on these shows, and once she was down there with the guys there was no way she was coming back up.   

 

I sort of admired Tyler's response when the other two came to him about Chris.  I also hate the two of them and how their strategy works.  And, I think Tyler won the challenge over Duffy because they knew he'd bring drama she probably wouldn't.  

 

On the plus side, I did appreciate the misdirect with Erik- having him talk at the beginning made me think he was going home at the end.  I also love the irony of this show having a challenge about consistency.  The flippin' judges weren't even consistent tonight in the rationale behind their choices.  Their application of the word "consistent" wasn't all that consistent, either (the flash challenge was for consistency, the main one was more about being faithful to the existing image).

 

I also enjoyed the contestants' reactions when Dave said the main challenge was about consistency.  So much drama when they already knew that was the theme...it was probably played out of sequence.

 

Oh- as a reality tv junkie I think it's also nice to see a show where the women aren't nearly as dramatic as the men.  It's consistently amusing how emotional these big tough tattooed guys get (Chris's "he called me names" was probably my favorite).

[azshadowwalker]

Chris was a Marine, y'all. 

 

Ugh. Hate him and Tyler both, but Matt and Katie did have the worst tattoos of the bunch tonight. I was just hoping it would be Kruseman who was sent packing solely to piss off Chris and Tyler. 

[akr]

I don't want to see any more shots of Tyler's tattooed hairless armpit. 

[MuMuGuy]

I could accept giving Tyler the win on the Flash Challenge since his was good, but I thought Duffy deserved the win.

 

As far as the Elimination Tattoo, they should've done a double elimination and Craig should've been booted as well. Excusing the fact that the challenge was more about replication than consistency, Craig didn't do that well at all. At least Katie didn't take artistic license with her swamp monster tattoo. Craig took artistic license on his tattoo. They should've at least called Craig down and called him out for not obeying instructions on both the Elimination Tattoo and Flash Challenge. I guess he misinterpreted the rules like Bill Belichick did during Spygate.

 

The judges need to start eliminating people that don't follow directions. Kruseman should've been gone that week he had the girl that wanted to use her hair since he basically gave up on the challenge and Kruseman has been failing his way through the show ever since.

Edited September 9, 2015 by MuMuGuy

[phoenix780]

Question- if Erik didn't win the head-to-head because the judges decided there was no winner, why wasn't he called back to the basement?  

 

Also, if you can sidestep to have no winner, can you also sidestep so there's no losing tattoo?

[phantom]

Question- if Erik didn't win the head-to-head because the judges decided there was no winner, why wasn't he called back to the basement?  

 

Also, if you can sidestep to have no winner, can you also sidestep so there's no losing tattoo?

 

I swear I remember way back in season 1 or 2 there was a challenge where all the tattoos were proficient, and no one was called out as the worst of the day.

[Charlesman]

Question- if Erik didn't win the head-to-head because the judges decided there was no winner, why wasn't he called back to the basement?  

 

Also, if you can sidestep to have no winner, can you also sidestep so there's no losing tattoo?

 

The head-to-head "losers" are not necessarily all of the people called down. That is, there may be 4, 5, 6, or more head-to-head losers, but the judges will only call down their worst 3 (or 4, if the Human Canvas Jury selects one person that is not among the judges' bottom 3).

 

 

Overall, I didn't hate this episode. I thought the painting challenge was interesting. Certainly a good way to judge proficiency, and a fair way to judge one artist's skill against another's. I'd love to see more challenges along these lines. Lots of room for creativity and talent to shine through, while also restrictive enough to provide good structure and judging criteria.

 

That said, "water lilies" may not have been the best choice for a tattoo. It's not very well-defined in it's shapes and didn't lend itself well in my opinion. I would rather have seen a Rembrandt or some other artist for a better chance at a good tattoo.

 

 

But at least they didn't torture the artists by giving them Seurat to tattoo... can you imagine the craziness of trying to do pointillism in 6 hours?

[Nutjob]

I always watch this show right after Face Off, and the difference in the contestants' attitudes is astounding. Like night and day.

 

I hated seeing Katie go before any of the posturing, immature boys. I think I'm now about Erik FTW.

[thewhiteowl]

I was sorry to see Katie go but that tattoo looked like a bunch of melted crayons to me. Not a Monet. Matt could have left for the Wilma Flintstone On the Half Shell. It irks that  Chris (he was a Marine, you know) is right and he's probably going to win. But seriously, his competition is lame.

[cpcathy]

As an art lover, I was hoping for more interesting paintings as inspiration. Hubby instantly said Klimt's The Kiss would have been good. Katie's Monet will look like a blue smudgy mess in a few years!

[OakGoblinFly]

As an art lover, I was hoping for more interesting paintings as inspiration. Hubby instantly said Klimt's The Kiss would have been good. Katie's Monet will look like a blue smudgy mess in a few years!

 

 

A few years?  It's pretty much a mess now - completely unreadable.  I feel sorry for that client - I have no idea how anyone can repair/cover up that tattoo.

Edited September 9, 2015 by OakGoblinFly

[leighdear]

I am not a Katie fan, so I was glad to see her go.  Her whole composition looked so drippy to me, like melted crayons.  I absolutely love Duffy, as I think she has both skills and a good attitude.  She stays away from most of the nastiness and posturing, so I always appreciate that. 

 

I have a soft spot for Craig, so I was pissed when he substituted those colors in his Scream tat.  But I'm thinking the incorrect shades could probably be re-colored down the road, to more closely match the original work. 

[MiseryIndex]

I know it's not just this season. And maybe it's just how they edit the film. But why does no one realize this is a competition and take things so personally?

Of course someone has to get the worst canvas. If you're good others want you gone. And if you're bad people will try to get rid of you because it's easy. Everyone has to go home at some point for someone else to win. I wish they would stop getting so butthurt over everything.

[azshadowwalker]

"The head-to-head "losers" are not necessarily all of the people called down. That is, there may be 4, 5, 6, or more head-to-head losers, but the judges will only call down their worst 3 (or 4, if the Human Canvas Jury selects one person that is not among the judges' bottom 3)."

The problem, though, is that Kruseman and Erik were considered equally bad. If they weren't actually equally bad, Erik should have been declared winner of the head-to-head. If they were equally bad, both or neither should have been downstairs.

[Jenkins]

Funny people keep mentioning Katies tattoo looking like melted crayons. When I saw the final product, my first thought was wow, that looks like a child ate some crayons and threw them back up...it was just THAT bad.

 

Sad part is, I am not even sure that CAN be covered up? Though her canvas seemed to be happy with it, so I guess who are we to judge? I would be horrified to have that on my body personally...though I would never go on this show to begin with where the goal is to give your competition tattoos you hope they can't do.

 

And yeah...Chris is a marine if you haven't heard...

 

You know, my grandfather served in Korea (navy), my dad in Vietnam (marines) and they NEVER talked about. They were both proud of their service, but they didn't use it as some sort of badge to constantly prove they are better than anyone.

 

As someone said, looks like Chris WILL win...can only imagine how smug he will be in victory.

 

I DO think production encourages the shit talking and drama. I would think tattoo artists would be a fairly tight knight group and not prone to constantly bashing each others work. These same producers also produced a woodworking competition and it was literally the same show. Competition and smack talk with a couple of arrogant douche bags thrown in.

[WickedTuna]

As an art lover, I was hoping for more interesting paintings as inspiration. Hubby instantly said Klimt's The Kiss would have been good. Katie's Monet will look like a blue smudgy mess in a few years!

I was hoping the same thing. I guess it was the best they could do when they were looking for people who would want the same thing. Maybe I'm wrong though. Are these people wanting to be on tv so badly they'll take any tattoo?

I wonder if Chris carries Tyler inside his overalls like a mama kangaroo when they aren't filming. Ha.

[akr]

I was hoping the same thing. I guess it was the best they could do when they were looking for people who would want the same thing. Maybe I'm wrong though. Are these people wanting to be on tv so badly they'll take any tattoo?

 

One of them pronounced "Van Gogh" as "Van Goff" - I don't think these were art lovers who were so inspired by a painting that they wanted something in particular on their body! Rather, they were probably given a couple of options and picked from among them. 

 

Klimt's the Kiss would be hard, I think - color is mostly too close to flesh tones? Well, I went looking for an image to confirm, and it does seem doable - but accidentally hit upon a page full of images of Klimt tattoos. Most of them are incoherent messes, and many of the ones that aren't are pale, sad imitations, far too oversimplified to still have any magic to them, but at least I can tell of what. A few actually work.

https://www.google.com/search?q=klimt+the+kiss&es_sm=122&tbm=isch&imgil=CLQOTxYsn_WOIM%253A%253BZhUk1EHh5cvn6M%253Bhttps%25253A%25252F%25252Fcommons.wikimedia.org%25252Fwiki%25252FFile%25253AKlimt_-_Der_Kuss.jpeg&source=iu&pf=m&fir=CLQOTxYsn_WOIM%253A%252CZhUk1EHh5cvn6M%252C_&usg=__oK40T3M_zU7kXFM6m5FpftRD3o4%3D#tbm=isch&q=klimt+the+kiss+tattoo

[Rancide]

One of them pronounced "Van Gogh" as "Van Goff" 

 

The latter is probably technically the more correct pronunciation (though also the less common one).  Van Gogh was Dutch, and his last name isn't really pronounceable using sounds found in the English language, but "Van Goff" is probably closer than "Van Gogh" and is the accepted pronunciation in UK British.  The "gh" in Dutch is kind of a gutteral sounds that still exists in many Germanic languages as well as some non-Germanic languages like Hebrew.  Americans just give up and end the name on an o sound.  The British at least try to do something to replicate the noises at the end.

 

All this to say, I'm pretty sure her pronunciation choice was deliberate.

[akr]

Thanks for the info!  I still think that for an American-accented person to use the equally incorrect Van Goff is a little like an American copying the BBC pronunciation of Nicaragua or Jaguar . . . pretentious and still wrong. 'f' and 'kh/ch' are sounds that rarely morph into one another, linguistically. I'm used to people trying to use the 'kh' sound in Arabic and only coming up with a 'h', never an 'f' or anything close to it. But I'm sure you're right, that it was a deliberate choice. 

[Kromm]

Katie is annoying and talent-light, but this particular week she got screwed over. A busted face like in that Venus was FAR worse than a reasonably accurate Monet, which was just cropped badly.  The real painting IS drippy. The only reason it might not be obvious to people what painting it was is because she didn't get enough of the painting on the body.

 

Any other week she'd probably deserve to go home, but this week they just didn't want to send home Matt and leave Chris without one of his big antagonists.

[OakGoblinFly]

Katie is annoying and talent-light, but this particular week she got screwed over. A busted face like in that Venus was FAR worse than a reasonably accurate Monet, which was just cropped badly.  The real painting IS drippy. The only reason it might not be obvious to people what painting it was is because she didn't get enough of the painting on the body.

 

Any other week she'd probably deserve to go home, but this week they just didn't want to send home Matt and leave Chris without one of his big antagonists.

 

 

But Katie's Monet wasn't a reasonably accurate rendering; it was unreadable from a distance and up close.  Monet's "drips" were purposeful; his paintings are readable from a distance and tend to become 'blurry' as you get closer to the work.  I think Duffy had the right approach to her tattoo. Enlarge a section so she can concentrate on the colors and shapes of the water lilies; making it clearly legible from a distance, blurry as you got closer, and clearly a Monet rendering.

 

Katie's work was extremely messy, dark, and a giant blob. I don't know how that poor client is going to fix that tattoo (I have a feeling she's having buyers regret and only said she 'loved' the tattoo because the other clients were ganging up on her) - it can't be repaired and it is so dark I doubt it could be covered up.

 

I found Katie's attitude during the judging annoying a a bit hypocritical.  She proclaimed a few episodes ago that 'blaming the client' or 'subject matter' was for weak artists and that any 'good' tattooist should be able to work on any client, on any body part, with any subject matter and yet she complained that she had the 'hardest' job.  She then followed this up with 'I'm a bad ass bitch' as a reason why she should stay - if I were a judge that comment alone would have been enough for me to send her packing, never mind the horrid stain she tattooed on her client. 

 

Even though Krusemen's tatto was missing the swirl and Matt's face was messed up, you could recognize the referenced masterpiece.

 

For all of Chris' jerkiness, I do believe he is loyal to Tyler.  I don't understand why it is so difficult for Craig and Matt to understand why Chris would want Tyler to succeed and why Chris is working with Tyler to ensure both of them make it pretty far in the competition.  Has not Matt stated on numerous occasions that he is there to support Katie and help her get to the finals?  Why is it different when Chris supports Tyler or Tyler supports his mentor?  It seems perfectly reasonable and indeed very likely that each master-apprentice pair would work to ensure that they reach the finals together.

 

Also, why the drama over the skull picks?  This is a competition and the skull pick is/can be an advantage; so why complain when someone utilizes the advantage?  Heck, Dave even tells the competitor to use the skull pick strategically; so why the drama, whining, and complaining when Tyler does just that?

 

Soooooo, other than the tangential comment about various religions forbidding tattoos, what does tattooing nail art have to do with a church?

 

I like the idea of translating a master painting to a tattoo; I just thought that the selected paintings were wonky - that had to be producer driven.

[Hana Chan]

Given that many younger artists now have some kind of arts training (with more than few having fine or visual arts degrees) in addition to their tattooing apprenticeships, this kind of challenge is a real test of their artistic sensibilities. I don't know if consistency was the right way to frame this challenge, but more an understanding and appreciation of the fine arts and being able to translate that into a coherent and readable tattoo.

 

Having said that, 6 hours just isn't long enough to get anything close to these paintings onto skin. As one of the artists (I believe Katie) pointed out, these paintings are layers upon layers of color and that's just not possible to manage in such a short period of time. The level of detail that these tattoos required just can't be fulfilled and I'm not surprised that several of the better artists were struggling. There is just no way to tattoo Botticelli's "The Birth of Venus" and not have it look unfinished after only six hours. No one had an easy time this week and it really separated the better artists from those that are just biding their time until their inevitable elimination.

 

Tyler surprised me with his rendition of The Scream, and it looked very close to the original painting. Craig's on the other hand, was really off and he was rightly zinged for his lack of attention to the painting's details. The judges were right that Chris's Venus looked very unfinished (though I give him props for getting as much done and pouring as much detail as he managed in the limited time). Matt's however, was a total mess. He totally blew it by not getting some of the details (like Venus's face) in before he totally lost the stencil impression. That face was a complete mess and he had a lot of other serious flaws (none of which had anything to do with his canvas's complexion or her lack of pain tolerance). And I'll agree that neither of the Van Gogh renditions was better than the other - both had some very serious flaws and missed key elements that make that painting so distinctive (and one of my personal favorites).

 

As for the Monet tattoos... these were going to be an absolute beast no matter who got saddled with it. While I love impressionistic paintings, they would really make very poor tattoos due to the lack of definition (which makes me think that these will not age well over the long run). I was really impressed with Duffy's take because it showed that she really understood how Monet works are meant to be viewed and it looked more than passable. Katie's, on the other hand, was a total mess. It just ended up a big, dark, blurry blob of color that barely resembled the original work. This had absolutely nothing to do with the canvas (who liked it a lot more than it deserved) or the placement and all about Katie's lack of understanding about this piece of work and her choices as an artist. It lacked any trace of the brightness of the original, and the impression of light on the water was non-existent. I don't see how this can possibly be fixed or covered and it just was a sloppy blur of dark ink.

 

There was no question to me about Katie going home this week (and no, being a "bad bitch" isn't justification for staying in the competition). While she's had some very good tattoos, her body of work as a whole doesn't match up to Matt's and all things being considered, he was the one who deserved a second chance after this total fail. Katie just ran out of steam at this stage. This is the point where good artists will go home for one bad tattoo and the only thing that saved Matt this week was that Katie's tattoo was indefensible.

 

Now... all this manipulating and strategizing that everyone keeps playing. It made total sense for Tyler to hand out the picks that he did in order to force the stronger artists to stumble. Putting Matt up against Chris was very clever, since I think that Chris is a better artist and had a better chance of pulling off the challenge than Matt did. And he definitely got Craig to fail (again). And Matt and Craig were wasting their time in trying to drive a wedge between Chris and Tyler. I have no doubt that all the apprentices feel some loyalty towards their mentors and even though they all want to win, if there's one person that each artist isn't likely to be a total dick to, it's going to be each mentor/mentee pairing.

Edited September 11, 2015 by Hana Chan

[psychoticstate]

I wonder if Chris carries Tyler inside his overalls like a mama kangaroo when they aren't filming. Ha.

 

This made me laugh so hard I cried.  Crap, I'm still laughing.

 

While I did think Katie's tattoo was a mess, I don't think she's a lesser artist than Duffy.  Will Ink Master ever get women artists that go the distance? We've had Sarah make it to the finale but has any other woman?  Did Tatu Baby?

 

I think these were just hard tattoos to ink.  The Scream was probably the easiest.  I agree that Craig should have had more of an ass chewing, and even gotten called down, based on his.  If the challenge is composition and he changes the colors, shouldn't that be a fail?

 

I know it was posted in the Redemption thread that Dave Navarro is a shit stirrer but I have to say that he is the most consistent of the judges.  I do like that he is a mediator and he does stick with the challenge.  Oliver often will say he will look at the entire body of work versus the challenge for that week, while Nunez seems to operate based on his personal feelings on the artists but Dave at least keeps to the challenge.  If the show is going to take into account the entire body of work, fine, then make that part of the rules and show past tattoos.  But be consistent.

[Hana Chan]

I like the idea of translating a master painting to a tattoo; I just thought that the selected paintings were wonky - that had to be producer driven.

 

I'm okay with the use of these particular paintings, as they were extremely well known. And all (except maybe for the Monet perhaps) would make lovely tattoos with enough time and a knowledgeable artist. And it kept the canvases from dragging out anything too obscure or really outrageous.

 

I mean... could you imagine someone wanting Bosch's "The Garden of Earthly Delights"? Someone would totally pass out at being stuck with that.

 

[LoneHaranguer]

 

Are these people wanting to be on tv so badly they'll take any tattoo?

I think they're happy to put the details of their tattoo into someone else's hands because they don't want to be responsible. The canvas with the losing tattoo was happy because she just wanted something that looked like a painting. She might have objected if was Dogs Playing Poker instead of something "artistic", but that's about it.

 

 

I still think that for an American-accented person to use the equally incorrect Van Goff is a little like an American copying the BBC pronunciation of Nicaragua or Jaguar . . . pretentious and still wrong.

She probably saw the episode of Doctor Who featuring Van Gogh and presumed that was the correct pronunciation.

 

 

We've had Sarah make it to the finale but has any other woman?  Did Tatu Baby?

Yes, but she was the first of the three to be eliminated in the S3 finale.

[BigBlueMastiff]

Okay Craig not only decided that his finger tattoos did not have be the same on each hand, but he chose to change the colors in The Scream, wtf? He should've gone home for disregarding the rules not once but twice.

[Hana Chan]

Okay Craig not only decided that his finger tattoos did not have be the same on each hand, but he chose to change the colors in The Scream, wtf? He should've gone home for disregarding the rules not once but twice.

 

Craig is skating on thin ice. Yes, he can put out good tattoos (they all can), but when you're so cocky that you'll ignore the rules of the challenge and what the judges are looking for, then you deserve to go home. Craig failed in both the flash challenge and the elimination tattoo. Not because he did bad work, but because his tattoos didn't meet the challenge.

 

And at some point, this is going to send him home. There is only so long you can get away with doing that because someone else did a worse tattoo. Most of the weak sauce has already been eliminated and as the judges like to say, one tattoo at this stage of the competition will be enough to send someone home. Good tattoo artists will be going home, not because they necessarily did a bad tattoo. Just that someone else did one just a little bit better. To handicap yourself by disregarding the challenge is just a stupid way of saying, "You know what? I don't need the title. Give Chris the check right now, because I'm a dumbass."

[Kromm]

While I did think Katie's tattoo was a mess, I don't think she's a lesser artist than Duffy.  Will Ink Master ever get women artists that go the distance? 

No we probably won't. The few times we've had women go far it's almost been by accident. Or rather Sarah finale placing almost seemed grudging by the show, and Tatu Baby going as far as she did (once) was because they liked focusing on her um... non-Tatooing qualities. This show has it in for women, it always has. Not that it isn't totally real that most of the experienced tattoo artists are men (because the show is just mirroring the real world). but you just know the better female artists gravitated to the (now canceled) other Tattoo show that aired on the "women's" TV channel (Best Ink on Oxygen) vs. this one on the macho man channel (Spike). 

[LoneHaranguer]

 

To handicap yourself by disregarding the challenge is just a stupid way of saying, "You know what? I don't need the title. Give Chris the check right now, because I'm a dumbass."

Consistency doesn't mean replication, so Craig stayed withing the challenge. On the nails, he was giving himself an edge by inviting the judges to see consistency that was randomly there, essentially tricking their minds by not having a repeated image to focus on. But, it's still not a good idea to piss off the guys who are subjectively deciding your fate, so your overall point is valid.

[Hana Chan]

Consistency doesn't mean replication, so Craig stayed withing the challenge. On the nails, he was giving himself an edge by inviting the judges to see consistency that was randomly there, essentially tricking their minds by not having a repeated image to focus on. But, it's still not a good idea to piss off the guys who are subjectively deciding your fate, so your overall point is valid.

 

Except that wasn't what they were told to do for the challenge. The judges wanted 2 designs done on five nails each to see how precise the artists could be with doing this kind of fine work repeatedly so that everything matched up. Placement, sizing, line work, etc. Craig's choice to do slightly different designs on each nail wasn't fulfilling that requirement and the judges were right to call him out on it.

 

I'm not saying that Craig is a bad artist, but we've seen people eliminated this season when the judges decided that failing to meet the challenge was enough to warrant being cut from the competition. And with pretty much all of the weaker artists already gone, this is the kind of thing that will get someone eliminated. If the judges are choosing between two equally good tattoos and one fulfilled the requirements of the challenge and one doesn't, then the odds are that the one who followed the challenge is the one who'll get to stay.

 

It was one of the things that I hated about St. Marq (besides his shitty attitude) - that no matter what the challenge was, he was just going to do his smooth black and grey and figure that it would be good enough to surpass what everyone else as doing. If Duffy and Tyler (the two weakest artists at this point in the competition) continue to rise to the challenges the way they've been lately and Craig keeps thinking that he's too clever for the competition and try to give the judges what he thinks they should get and not what they're asking for, he'll knock himself out.

Okay Craig not only decided that his finger tattoos did not have be the same on each hand, but he chose to change the colors in The Scream, wtf? He should've gone home for disregarding the rules not once but twice.

 

If Katie's tattoo hadn't been such an irredeemable (and unrepairable) mess, he might very well have. The only thing that saved him this weak was Katie's big blue blob and Matt's Wilma Flintstone Venus.

[OakGoblinFly]

Okay Craig not only decided that his finger tattoos did not have be the same on each hand, but he chose to change the colors in The Scream, wtf? He should've gone home for disregarding the rules not once but twice.

 

 

Did the judges say the designs had to be the same on each hand?  I think they only said that the designs had to be repeated across five nails ...... Katie (I think) tattooed a sun and moon alternating between fingers ... end result was still five suns and five moons.

[WickedTuna]

She might have objected if was Dogs Playing Poker instead of something "artistic", but that's about it.

-LoL- Good point...I hadn't thought of it that way. It would have been fun though to see the people who would want that as a tattoo. Chris comes to mind. Ha.

[PepperMonkey]

Dammit, now I want a Dogs Playing Poker tattoo.

 

Chris probably will win, about which I have mixed emotions. He's actually really good, but he's such a douche, it's hard to root for him. My grandfather was in the Army in WWII and my father was an Airman in Korea and Viet Nam and they never talked about it either. They just lived the credo. I will say if this comes down to Chris and Tyler in the finale, I will whole-heartedly be rooting for Chris. I seriously dislike Tyler's personality and attitude, in general.

 

When this first started, I was rooting really hard for Craig. I liked him so much on his first time around, even with his black and gray aversion, but this time, I go back and forth hard on him. I like when he's disappointed to have let down his human canvas, but his The Scream was terrible. It wasn't as bad as Katie's, though, and her departure was the right one. I will miss her Tootsie Pop Owl-ness every week, though.

 

I keep kind of hoping Erik will make a latter stage comeback. He seemed to start out so strong and he's faded recently. I'm pulling for him, still holding out hope someone besides Chris will win.

[Hana Chan]

I'm going to give credit where credit is due - Tyler showed a lot of intelligence in how he handled the skill picks. He put comparably talented artists against one another, which was the best chance he'd have of throwing one of the stronger competitors into the bottom. He wouldn't survive a matchup against Matt or Chris, but Craig was manageable. Especially with Craig's habit of going off the reservation and making seriously questionable color choices. Putting himself up against Craig (or one of the girls) was Tyler's best chance of coming out with a win. 

 

And it certainly hurt three of the strongest contenders. We're at the stage of the competition where their overall body of work is going to be considered when it comes time for elimination decisions and he managed to give Matt, Kruseman and Erik a major stumble. It really was intelligently done and it's not something I would have considered Tyler capable of.

[thewhiteowl]

 I would have been impressed if I thought that Tyler had done anything other than exactly what Chris told him to do.

[Eliza422]

Klimt's the Kiss would be hard, I think - color is mostly too close to flesh tones? Well, I went looking for an image to confirm, and it does seem doable - but accidentally hit upon a page full of images of Klimt tattoos. Most of them are incoherent messes, and many of the ones that aren't are pale, sad imitations, far too oversimplified to still have any magic to them, but at least I can tell of what. A few actually work.

https://www.google.com/search?q=klimt+the+kiss&es_sm=122&tbm=isch&imgil=CLQOTxYsn_WOIM%3A%3BZhUk1EHh5cvn6M%3Bhttps%253A%252F%252Fcommons.wikimedia.org%252Fwiki%252FFile%253AKlimt_-_Der_Kuss.jpeg&source=iu&pf=m&fir=CLQOTxYsn_WOIM%3A%2CZhUk1EHh5cvn6M%2C_&usg=__oK40T3M_zU7kXFM6m5FpftRD3o4%3D#tbm=isch&q=klimt+the+kiss+tattoo

Oooof...the background color of that painting is a rough color to pull off...even the good ones look strange on skin.

[AlliePK]

 

Sad part is, I am not even sure that CAN be covered up? Though her canvas seemed to be happy with it, so I guess who are we to judge? I would be horrified to have that on my body personally...though I would never go on this show to begin with where the goal is to give your competition tattoos you hope they can't do.

 

 

I wouldn't even attempt to cover that mess up and I'm pretty good at cover ups.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

I was sorry to see Katie go but that tattoo looked like a bunch of melted crayons to me. Not a Monet.

Not that I'm defending Katie's mess of a tattoo, but I feel that Clueless must be quoted now.

 

Tai: Do you think she's pretty?

Cher: No, she's a full-on Monet.

Tai: What's a Monet?

Cher: It's like a painting, see? From far away, it's OK, but up close, it's a big old mess.

 

 

 

And yeah...Chris is a marine if you haven't heard...

 

You know, my grandfather served in Korea (navy), my dad in Vietnam (marines) and they NEVER talked about. They were both proud of their service, but they didn't use it as some sort of badge to constantly prove they are better than anyone.

Seriously. One of my best friends is a tiny badass girl who was a Marine and she almost never mentions it. She knows she is still a badass and she doesn't need to tell people she was a Marine to feel superior.

 

So does Chris have only one pair of overalls or has he been washing the same pair?

I am trying to decide what would be more amusing: seeing Chris wash his overalls in the bathroom sink every night and hanging them to dry on the towel rack or having him open his suitcase and seeing 25 pairs of identical overalls.

 

 

I still think that for an American-accented person to use the equally incorrect Van Goff is a little like an American copying the BBC pronunciation of Nicaragua or Jaguar . . . pretentious and still wrong.

I think they are two separate issues. An American imitating a British pronunciation of a non-English word is silly, but anyone who speaks any language trying to pronounce a word similar to the native way (as opposed to the ridiculously bastardized English version) is okay in my book because at least they're trying to get closer to the authentic pronunciation. It hurts my brain when I watch British cooking shows and I hear how horribly the British have chosen to pronounce foreign words (although sometimes I laugh and cringe at the same time, like when I hear taco pronounced as tack-oh).

Edited September 16, 2015 by ElectricBoogaloo