Geometric Wolf Tattoo

Straight lines and curved bodies

A geometric design is built from straight edges and exact angles, and the human body has none of either.

What happens is predictable once you have seen it. A straight line laid across a cylindrical limb appears to bow. A perfect circle on a forearm reads as an oval. Right angles stop looking like right angles as the surface turns away from the viewer.

None of this is a fault in the design. It is geometry meeting anatomy, and it is why geometric tattoo work is considered technically demanding: the artist has to distort the drawing so that it looks undistorted on a body.

What to do about it

Place a geometric piece where the surface is flattest and turns away least: the inner forearm rather than the outer, the shoulder blade rather than the shoulder cap, the upper back, the outer thigh.

And look at it from the angle it will normally be seen from, not from directly above, before you commit.

On sacred geometry

The style is often sold with claims about ancient meaning encoded in the shapes. Mostly it is not. These are pleasing arrangements, which is a perfectly good reason to wear one.

The tattoo

5.3 x 9.5 cm, a small upright design.

See the wolf temporary tattoo range.

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