Eric Perfect Tattoo History Interview with Josh Arment

Eric Perfect sits down to talk with Aloha Monkey Tattoo’s own tattoo superstar Josh Arment!

Aloha Monkey Shop Art : Original Ed Hardy

- So we're just showing you some of the gems here at the Aloha Monkey. This is an original Ed Hardy painting. Believe I got it in 2005. It is on red amate paper, so the paper's the red, and then Ed did a series of these where he did different silhouettes, and inside the silhouette he drew or he painted quite a bit of different imagery inside each silhouette, so he did one that was fudo, he did this native one, he did a cowboy, and so it was a series on this handmade amate paper, and I got to see this in 2001, when I got my chest done, it was in the San Francisco Museum and so I got to see that along with the other ones, and by the time I got my hands on it in 2005, it was the last one left, Chris Trevino got the rest of them, good on you, Chris. But yeah, it's just an amazing piece, and I was fortunate enough to be able to seize it. Hung in my house for quite a few years, and then when we moved into the big shop, I brought it over here, because it was the perfect centerpiece for this big room that we got, so it's one of my favorite pieces.

Aloha Monkey Shop Art : Mike Malone Flash Wall

- So, this is our flash, one of our flash walls here in the shop, and it is all Mike Malone stuff. This is mostly from his 1999 set where he, if, whoever bought the first, I forget how many sheets, er, the first however many sets you got an original with it. And, a flash is just super interesting and it's something that's always spoken to me cause it's just, like Ed put it so well, it's just a distillation of everything in life. Drama, to sex, to love, uh, bravado, faith. And so, Malone being one of the best designers of flash, he would always come up with really interesting sheets. They always said something, they had some type of wording. There was always something on these sheets that was for everybody, you know? Uh, not each sheet was like, for men only. I mean, there was always some little, cute rose, or, you know. But it got people looking around. It wasn't like a single sheet of tigers, or a single sheet of bats. It was like, it was just a spread out idea source. And so it just got you visually looking through the whole shop. And that's what I really like about it. It's all done in watercolor, you know? So, now-a-days people come in, they say they want a watercolor tattoo, and it's like, I know what they're referring to. They want that smeared outside the line business, but, these were all done in watercolor. And, uh, that's traditionally how all flash was painted, and still is. So, this is a great wall.

Aloha Monkey Shop Art : Battle Royale

- This is a Battle Royale depiction based off an Ed Hardy Battle Royale that he did. But this piece was created by me that same summer that Richard was staying with me in 2009 Uzzy was coming through to do a guest spot. And so me and Uzzy were gonna work on this Battle Royale and just have a little painting party but Richard comes in and hates the way that we're doing the snake and so he just kinda over takes it. And so that's what was wrong with our entire snake drawing and so eventually he took out the snake Uzzy took out the eagle, and I took out the dragon. But it was fun, little collaboration between us three.