tattoos with intention
I approach my practice of tattooing with reverence & respect. I create tattoos from a grounded place, where I coach my clients into the clearest form of their self expression. I help people simplify, clarify and refine so that we can create a tattoo that feels authentically theirs. My intention in my work is to make the best tattoo for my client possible.
I work ritualistically, with meditation and ceremony. In my practice of tattooing I share many tools and tricks I have learned along the way; breath techniques, mindfulness, pain management tools.
Discomfort and challenge are part of this process but the truth is transformation is rarely comfortable, (this is alchemy) and yet, the more comfortable the client is the better I can do my job. I do everything I can to support and guide my clients through every session so that we get the best outcome; a clean and precise tattoo.
I see tattoos as a sacred art form, a deeply human and primal urge; a ritual beyond time.
MY TATTOO PROCESS
Complete Form
Complete the submission form by clicking the button below. Include images & details to explain what you want. If you don’t have specifics yet, simply share what is compelling you to get tattooed.
This is a free meeting either in person at Under My Thumb Tattoo or via zoom if distance prohibits presence. In this meeting we will discuss your ideas, potential options, & make a plan of action.
Depending on the scale and detail of your tattoo we will book one or more sessions to complete it. If more than one, the sessions will be spaced out for proper healing and integration.
Step 1
Step 2
Book consultation
Book appointment
CHOOSE YOUR OWN ADVENTURE
Step 3
5000+
people tattooed
20+
Years in the biz
500+
tattoos covered up
40,000+
hours in session
a ceremony for skin & spirit
CLIENT
EXPERIENCES
Being tattooed by India is less about her tattooing you as it is about collaborating in an intimate way. From beginning with a meditation to breathing techniques to help you get through the spicier moments, India works not only as artist but as guide through an experience. This is wildly different from other tattoo experiences, which can often feel transactional. I hope that after leaving a session with Inida she feels as accomplished as I did with my piece.
- Josh
"This is wildly different from other tattoo experiences..."
I am a mixed Indigenous person who is deeply spiritual. It took me years to find the right person who could approach the art I was seeking for my dodem, but as soon as I met India I knew she was the one.
I’ve been a client of India’s for 4 years now. India’s ink is imbued with magic, skill, and care. Her art flows within the divine feminine and follows the paths of the unspoken truths of our universe. I have never had a more pleasurable tattoo experience as India uses her knowledge of yoga nidra to calm your nervous system. She uses her words to speak to the deep spaces within you that need to listen to what you already know. She uses her connection to spirit to create ritual, and her love of others to engage with you in ceremony.
India, you are truly a gift to this world not only through your art but how you provide healing on so many levels to others via your many talents.
- Sam
"Getting tattooed by India is truly a transcendental experience."
Getting tattooed, for me, has been a way in which I could travel inward, to a place where I can touch what was once hidden, whether it be another layer of my grief or a budding sense of self-love. What better person to guide me on this journey than India.
Her work, apart from it being gorgeous and phenomenal, has always been about relationship; to each other, as the tattooer and tattooed, and to the unknown mystery. I am grateful for her generosity of spirit and care, and look forward to our next journey together.
- Therese
"Getting tattooed has been a way in which I could travel inward, to a place where I can touch what was once hidden."
Tattoos most often happen after pivotal life events. The complex nature of moving through challenge, the deep internal process of navigating emotions and growth is generally intangible. Tattoos offer a very unique quality of catharsis; offering chosen, self prescribed sensation or discomfort; taking the intangible into the tangible realms. Often, people feel a great sense of relief, a beautiful kind of acceptance, a welcome quality of surrender to the fiery feeling of needles in skin. Many cultures, through much of time have known this wisdom and offered it as treatment through times of challenge.
Scribe-of-the-soul
FAQ:
What to expect
Spend time with yourself reflecting on why you want to get tattooed? What is motivating you? Which part of you is excited, which part is scared? Feel into where on your body you want your future tattoo, you can even ask your body for guidance. Does this tattoo idea carry its own wisdom or medicine? If you meditate, sit with it, allow your higher mind to reveal more insight.
The more energy and time you pour into this the more natural and authentic your tattoo will feel.
How do I prepare?
Please fill out this submission form, answer all of the questions with care and share anything you feel is relevant or important for me to know to make the best piece I can for you.
Upload your chosen images, (we will have a chance to look at more this is just giving me a teaser to see where we are going). This form will encourage you book a consultation with me in which we meet to discuss your ideas and turn them into a plan. In this meeting you can ask me any questions about your tattoo and in the mean time you are most welcome to email me at connect@indiaamara.com
Once I'm ready, how do I begin this process?
1. The tattoo is technically sound. This usually means it was made by a professional, the lines are clean and consistent, the fill or shading is smooth and or saturated.
2. The tattoo was done with longevity in mind. This means the tattoo was done large enough to accommodate the fact that you are a human and that everything in life softens with time. Tattoos settle in within the first few months, as they become more integrated. Over the years your skin cells move, you are an organic water based organism, the lines will thicken slightly, the saturation of colour or contrast of black in the skin will fade slightly. You can recognize when a tattoos have been done too small or too detailed they become blurry or unidentifiable blobs.
3. Your tattoo feels good. When a tattoo is done well, with intention and care, it can feel like remembering a part of yourself, it can feel like it had always been there - as though it has simply emerged or been revealed. When a tattoo feels right, you may feel more at home in your own skin, more confident, more powerful, more authentic.
When a tattoo is done well, you feel more like you.
What makes a good tattoo?
When I got my backpiece done by the living legend, Filip Leu, I asked him this question, his reply was "India, your tattoos should go grey as your hair goes grey.".
Taking care of your skin is important, please do, the sun is powerful. Moisturize your skin, exfoliate your skin, be active, support your circulation, take care of you. Wearing sunscreen can prolong the vibrancy of your tattoo and also, please live your life with joy to be outside and in nature. You cannot fight gravity (though many of us attempt to). Everything in life softens with time, the lines of your tattoo will soften through the decades, the density or saturation of your tattoo will soften through your long days, take it as a win, it shows who you were when you got the tattoo and how much life you have lived since then, it honestly gives you cred, it reveals character and it shows a life lived well.
How do I maintain my tattoo?
The craft of tattooing is a practice riddled with variables, mostly those variables lay with you, the client. The cost of a tattoo is based on many things; size, location on the body, detail, colour or black and grey, solid black or line work only, intricacy or complexity... ultimately you are paying for the time it takes the artist to make the tattoo.
Another aspect of variables is how well you receive the tattoo. If you are calm and steady, the tattoo artist can work with better efficacy. If you are having a hard time, squirming, fidgeting, taking many breaks, all of this inhibits the tattoo artist from being able to do their job well, so it adds time. (If you are having a hard time getting tattooed, communicate to the artist, often they will have ways to support you).
Practically speaking:
I charge $250/hr or $1250/day +HST
I can give you a rough quote once we have had a consultation, after you share the details of what you want, I can let you know how much currency/energy/money will be required for the exchange.
