The UK dotwork specialist who’s decorating women with purpose
After she explained how she found harmony at 29 through her dotwork tattoos, our Chloe Davis-Powell now interviews Mumma Knucklez about her dotwork:
What drew you to specialise in dotwork?
As someone who started getting tattooed in the late 90’s and started my first apprenticeship in the early 00’s, I experienced a lot of heavy handed tattoos, and harsh healing. But one day a seriously heavy session on my original backpiece left my skin shredded. The healing was genuinely traumatic, leaving me with deep scarification. This pushed my way of thinking and discovery towards the saturation of skin cells and achieving the most effective result with the least amount of trauma. Dotwork allows the artist to use the skin as a value, so lightening the shade simply means less dots are applied. It’s a lot easier for skin to heal lots of tiny areas than it is one large one. Dotwork does require far more patience when it comes to application time, but my work is fully healed within 14 days and that was my ultimate goal. My rad clients in these photos both complemented their healing process by using ethical CBD lavender infused balms made with love by a dear friend Annie Bair, the mastermind behind Bair’s Witch and Bair’s Necessities.
What type of clients do you most enjoy working with?
I find that most of my clients have similar energies or mindsets. As unique as all my clients are, I know that if I was to have all of them in one room they would all enjoy one another’s company. I think due to the style in which I tattoo and the way that I book people in, attracts a certain type of person. The kind of people who want the tattooist to care about the client as much as the tattoo. I always do face to face consultations with every client before tattooing them for the first time. This allows both the client and myself to see if I’m truly the right artist for them. But I guess to answer the question simply is to say that the clients I most enjoy working with are those that trust me with their stories and allow me to convert them into a lifelong decoration through my style. You’ll see in these photos of my clients taken by the brilliant Adam Davis-Powell (@demonrace) similarities in the ink style but stark differences in pattern, these are the personal dots of these women’s unique experiences and what makes this work so special.
How do you come up with such complex patterns?
I was lucky enough to be exposed to a multitude of cultures from a really young age. Having the observational mind that I do, a lot of time was spent comparing similarities and differences between all of their visual cues. But I always found that most of my attention was repeatedly drawn to ancient imagery. The individuality of each culture’s iconography and the importance of each mark made. I was drawn to the many clearly defined styles with strict narrative rules being placed on every composition, all containing mathematical patterns. I saw that everything from large architectural structures to small everyday items were decorated with repeating patterns – the idea that sacred geometry is the one thing we can all agree on, it felt like everyone could find at least one base pattern that fits comfortably with their aesthetic schema.
The specific program I use to create bespoke patterns for my clients is Geometrica. Geometrica was created by Corey Ferguson (@coreyferguson) and tested by geometric tattoo artists around the world. It is above and beyond the best geometric design app available.
What’s your background in tattooing and how did you end up running your own specialist dotwork studio?
The first person to put faith in me was Scott Dennis at Lure Tattoos in West Virginia, USA. Scott was also the first person to do a dotwork piece on me, covering up a bad tattoo that he could just sense existed – as I hid it at first. Scott was a good mentor, allowing me to find my feet with small jobs and was always up for answering questions. Scott then sent me to Cleveland, Ohio to study under David Vidra – an integral figure in pushing body modification towards legitimacy in the eyes of Federal and medical agencies.
After Bush was put in power for a second term I decided I couldn’t live in the states anymore and managed to get a placement at the Emily Carr Institute of Art and Design in Vancouver, Canada. Upon meeting the most wonderful people in that beautiful city I was introduced to my next mentor, Steven. A woman with the strength of a hundred humans. When I met her, Steven was in the process of opening Pointless Enigma in Vancouver, and I was overjoyed when asked to be a part of it. Steven and her clientele taught me so much, about tattooing, about life, about kindness, and about myself. When my student visa ran out, sadly so did my time there. I tried hard to get a residential visa, but it didn’t work out and honestly I’ve felt rather homesick ever since.
Back to London I went, where I had originally grown up. I practically forced my way into a studio there, determined to get back on the machines, and later in a twist of medical miracles, I actually became pregnant (having been told it wouldn’t be possible years beforehand). But after realising we needed a kinder, more peaceful environment, I decided to bring my incredible daughter to the Somerset countryside.
It was here in Somerset that I felt strongly I needed to create real and authentic space for my work and the kind of customers I love to work with. A completely private space in which they can choose what kind of environment they need, enter their own headspace and sometimes even drift off without the worry of being observed by anyone else. It took some solid years of determination, drained savings, tackling multiple council barriers and starting out with some terrible landlords. But quite some time later it eventually paid off, and I was blessed with new amazing landlords who have been such a support, especially through the pandemic.
What is a time being tattooed personally that you felt change in your own body and mind?
All of my experiences at Divine Canvas in London (@divinecanvas) resonate with me – back when it was owned by Xed LeHead and run by his talented wife Kazz, who has an ora of love that radiates with every heartbeat. It was truly the most amazing safe space for all the proudly weird and wonderful souls that passed through the portal from the street into that realm.
I went there to ask the phenomenal artist Deryn Twelve (@deryntwelvetattoo) if she would create a seamless body pattern to wrap around my chest, upper back and down my arms. This was really pushing the boundaries of a woman’s chest piece, as back then tattooists generally avoided the breast area for chest designs. I should explain, at this point I had just started losing baby weight and had been single for a long time, so there was this real sense of body insecurity that had sadly crept in over the years, and the step to get this major tattoo was my way of ‘stepping back in’ to my own, true self.
Getting that tattoo placement just right was simultaneously my first introduction to some of my biggest inspirations when it comes to my own work. I introduced myself to studio owner the brilliant Xed LeHead, and asked if he felt the giant stencil across me was in the perfect placement. In response he studied it, stating he thought it was perfect, and showed interest in my own work as a dot work artist. Between that moment and the continued experiences I had as a guest spot artist there, I was able to build my confidence and hold my head higher, and dream bigger for my work. Other artists there including Alice Newstead (@aliceofthedead), Touka Voodoo (@stockholmalternative) who has started my perfect backpiece and one day will finish it, PHred (@Phrederic) and body modifier Iestyn Flye have all influenced my journey.
Do you have advice for women who want to learn to tattoo or be tattooed with purpose?
I think it’s a whole new, more positive world for women in the tattoo industry from when I got started. Women don’t have to prove their ‘toughness’ to get an apprenticeship, and from what I am seeing it’s more about individuality and a strong consistent sense of style. I am so incredibly glad to see and support this shift of focus towards individual art over gender and perceived ‘toughness’ in my lifetime.
For the wonderful women out there looking to get tattooed with purpose, I’d strongly advise making sure you really do connect with your chosen artist/s on a personal level. Be really sure of the style you want, and research all the artists that, and show consistency of quality in their niche style. There are always the big names and the convention award winners – and yes they are amazing at what they do – but there are also many others who aren’t all over social media – who are more focused on client connection and helping to curate that personal forever-art. Talk to people you see in the street wearing ink that truly inspires you, ask them who did it, and how their experience was of that person. Word of mouth is how I’ve met some of my favourite ever people.
How do people get tattooed by you?
Contact me via my studio facebook page Sirens Tattoo Parlour or my Instagram artist page @Mumma_Knucklez or email info@sirensdotwork.com to apply for a consultation session!
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Words by Chloe Davis-Powell. Photos by Adam Davis-Powell.
