Tattoos
Last modified: 6:05:13 CET on 24 Jan, 2009 |
John had six tattoos done on his arms in the period from 1988 to late 1990 (nowhere else, unlike the rest of the RHCP who have had their backs, legs, chest and even heads tattooed). However, due to his drug abuse, four out of six tattoos have been partially damaged and one of them has completely disappeared.
These images should give you a clue about which tattoo is/was where on John's arms; and for those which have been damaged, there's a photo of how they looked like before and how they look like now.
This is the only tattoo John has that's still in its original shape, it was not damaged. It was designed by Henk Schiffmacher also known as Henky Penky and it's a take on Native American flashes.
The face was inspired by the cover image on jazz musicioan Ornette Coleman's album Dancing In Your Head. You can view the original image here. Right above this tattoo, closer to the elbow, there's another one which is a small tribal pattern, very similar to the design on John's left shoulder.
This beautiful octopus was designed by Henk Schiffmacher also known as Henky Penky and it's meant to serve as a souvenir from the Positive Mental Octopus tour the band did to promote their Mother's Milk album. Chad Smith has had a more stylish octopus done, but on his thigh.
This is the same design that Anthony Kiedis has in the same place - just RHCP's symbol, an asterisk. Many Red Hot Chili Peppers' admirers around the world have the very same tattoo done on their own wrists or elsewhere on their bodies.
This simple design represented simplified symbols of a man and a woman, having sex. The disappearance of this tattoo was never clear enough, as right after he'd returned to the band, John said that he had it removed and later stories were involving either skin graphs or arms being badly burnt in a fire caused by freebasing.
