Jonathan Dowling Shaw (born July 4, 1953) is an American tattoo artist and writer. He founded New York City's oldest tattoo shop, Fun City Tattoo, in 1976, before tattooing was legal in the city.

Early life

Shaw was born in 1953. His father was

big band A big band or jazz orchestra is a type of musical ensemble of jazz music that usually consists of ten or more musicians with four sections: saxophones, trumpets, trombones, and a rhythm section. Big bands originated during the early 1910s an ...

musician and

bandleader A bandleader is the leader of a music group such as a rock or pop band or jazz quartet. The term is most commonly used with a group that plays popular music as a small combo or a big band, such as one which plays jazz, blues, rhythm and blues or ...

Artie Shaw, and his mother was the musicians' seventh wife, actress

Doris Dowling Doris Dowling (May 15, 1923 – June 18, 2004) was an American actress of film, stage and television. Best known for the films '' The Crimson Key'' (1946) and ''Bitter Rice'' (1949). Also known for playing Irene Adams on ''My Living Doll'' (19 ...

. He was raised in Los Angeles, and from his own description had a very rough upbringing. His parents' marriage dissolved when he was three years old, and he developed a

heroin Heroin, also known as diacetylmorphine and diamorphine among other names, is a potent opioid mainly used as a recreational drug for its euphoric effects. Medical grade diamorphine is used as a pure hydrochloride salt. Various white and brow ...

addiction in his teenage years, occupying his time with varied acts of juvenile delinquency. At age 19, while working at the ''

Los Angeles Free Press The ''Los Angeles Free Press'', also called the "''Freep''", is often cited as the first, and certainly was the largest, of the underground newspapers of the 1960s. The ''Freep'' was founded in 1964 by Art Kunkin, who served as its publisher unti ...

'', he met the author Charles Bukowski who inspired him to hitchhike from Los Angeles to Rio de Janeiro in 1972. He arrived in South America, finding work as a deckhand and tattoo artist.

Career

Fun City Tattoo

Returning to the United States in 1976, Shaw relocated to the

Bowery The Bowery () is a street and neighborhood in Lower Manhattan in New York City. The street runs from Chatham Square at Park Row, Worth Street, and Mott Street in the south to Cooper Square at 4th Street in the north.Jackson, Kenneth L. "B ...

neighborhood in Manhattans'

Lower East Side The Lower East Side, sometimes abbreviated as LES, is a historic neighborhood in the southeastern part of Manhattan in New York City. It is located roughly between the Bowery and the East River from Canal to Houston streets. Traditionally an im ...

where he opened Fun City Tattoo, the oldest tattoo shop in New York City, where he specialized in neo-tribal tattoos and tattooed celebrities as

Johnny Depp John Christopher Depp II (born June 9, 1963) is an American actor and musician. He is the recipient of multiple accolades, including a Golden Globe Award and a Screen Actors Guild Award, in addition to nominations for three Academy Award ...

Iggy Pop James Newell Osterberg Jr. (born April 21, 1947), known professionally as Iggy Pop, is an American singer, musician, songwriter and actor. Called the "Honorific nicknames in popular music, Godfather of Punk", he was the vocalist and lyricist of ...

Jim Jarmusch James Robert Jarmusch (; born January 22, 1953) is an American film director and screenwriter. He has been a major proponent of independent cinema since the 1980s, directing films including '' Stranger Than Paradise'' (1984), '' Down by Law'' ( ...

Max Cavalera Massimiliano Antonio "Max" Cavalera (; born August 4, 1969) is a Brazilian musician. He co-founded the heavy metal band Sepultura in 1984 with his brother Igor Cavalera, and was the band's lead singer and rhythm guitarist until his departure i ...

(

Sepultura Sepultura (, "grave")Barcinski & Gomes 1999, page 17. is a Brazilian heavy metal band from Belo Horizonte. Formed in 1984 by brothers Max and Igor Cavalera,Barcinski & Gomes 1999, page 16. the band was a major force in the groove metal, thra ...

) and

Kate Moss Katherine Ann Moss (born 16 January 1974) is a British model. Arriving at the end of the "supermodel era", Moss rose to fame in the early 1990s as part of the heroin chic fashion trend. Her collaborations with Calvin Klein brought her to fas ...

. Tattooing, however, had been illegal in New York City in 1961, and wasn't legalized until 1997. Shaw later founded the first magazine exclusively dedicated to tattoos, ''International Tattoo Art'' in the 1980s. In 1990, Jonathan Shaw,

and

founded the Death Is Certain Club to celebrate their friendship. The club involved each member getting a matching ring and tattoo.

Retirement and writing career

Shaw sold Fun City in 2002, after only five years of legal operation, to focus on writing. After 28 years tattooing, Jonathan retired from the profession in 2004 and moved back to Rio de Janeiro, where he wrote his first novel ''Narcisa: Our Lady of Ashes'', published in 2008 by

HarperCollins HarperCollins Publishers LLC is one of the Big Five English-language publishing companies, alongside Penguin Random House, Simon & Schuster, Hachette, and Macmillan. The company is headquartered in New York City and is a subsidiary of News Cor ...

described Shaw as "the great nightmare anti-hero of the new age". His memoir, entitled ''Scab Vendor'', was published in 2017.

Bibliography

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References

External links

Personal site
{{DEFAULTSORT:Shaw, Jonathan Living people 1953 births American tattoo artists Place of birth missing (living people) 21st-century American novelists