{"id":18995,"date":"2025-09-13T09:05:55","date_gmt":"2025-09-13T09:05:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=18995"},"modified":"2025-09-13T09:05:55","modified_gmt":"2025-09-13T09:05:55","slug":"blind-tattoo-artist-in-russia-impresses-customers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=18995","title":{"rendered":"Blind tattoo artist in Russia impresses customers"},"content":{"rendered":"
Like a piano player moving up a scale, Igor Mikhaylov runs\u00a0his\u00a0gloved hands along\u00a0his\u00a0client’s upturned arm, feeling out precisely where he should place\u00a0his\u00a0stencil.<\/p>\n

The 38-year-old\u00a0tattoo\u00a0artist, who is legally\u00a0blind, is in high\u00a0demand.<\/p>\n

“This\u00a0is something that impresses and thrills you,”\u00a0said a woman who gave her name only as\u00a0Alexandra. She had\u00a0just\u00a0received a\u00a0tattoo\u00a0saying\u00a0“Love” in Braille from Mikhaylov at a\u00a0tattoo\u00a0studio off Moscow’s trendy Novy Arbat Avenue last month.<\/p>\n

Mikhaylov began to lose\u00a0his\u00a0eyesight at the age of eight, the result of a genetic illness. He can perceive gradations in light and can make out the contours of objects. He still remembers what the world around him looks like.<\/p>\n

His\u00a0customers find\u00a0his\u00a0tattoos exciting because they demand an imaginative leap of\u00a0faith.<\/p>\n

“The visual images that I have today are in fact being completed with the help of my imagination and my memory. In other words, what I imagine is much sharper than what I can see now,” Mikhaylov explained.<\/p>\n

A trained classical guitarist and graduate of a top Moscow music college, Mikhaylov approaches the art of\u00a0tattooing with nimble fingers and an open mind. There’s no instruction manual for how to\u00a0tattoo\u00a0blind.<\/p>\n

Mikhaylov’s customers choose a word or phrase, which he translates into Braille. He then\u00a0tattoos the image onto the skin using a single\u00a0needle\u00a0dipped into ink, what is known as a stick-and-poke\u00a0tattoo.<\/p>\n

“How to take a\u00a0needle\u00a0to this\u00a0or that corner, how to find this\u00a0middle line, which way to use to move a\u00a0needle\u00a0in corners \u2013 it all reminded me of working with a (guitar) string where these small aspects and peculiarities matter,” Mikhaylov said. “I had to develop my own technique.”<\/p>\n

In between\u00a0tattooing gigs and music performances, Mikhaylov\u00a0finds\u00a0time to win tournament trophies as a member of Russia’s national table tennis team for the visually impaired.<\/p>\n

A neon sign hanging on the wall by\u00a0his\u00a0work station in the Moscow\u00a0tattoo\u00a0parlour could serve as Mikhaylov’s personal mantra: “Your Comfort Zone Will Kill You”.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Like a piano player moving up a scale, Igor Mikhaylov runs\u00a0his\u00a0gloved hands along\u00a0his\u00a0client’s upturned arm, feeling out precisely where he should place\u00a0his\u00a0stencil. The 38-year-old\u00a0tattoo\u00a0artist, who is legally\u00a0blind, is in high\u00a0demand. “This\u00a0is something that impresses and thrills you,”\u00a0said a woman who gave her name only as\u00a0Alexandra. She had\u00a0just\u00a0received a\u00a0tattoo\u00a0saying\u00a0“Love” in Braille from Mikhaylov at a\u00a0tattoo\u00a0studio off […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18995","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18995","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18995"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18995\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18995"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18995"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18995"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}