On duty

Photographed at the Coney Island Sideshow by Dan Nicoletta

काली

Photographed by Efrain Gonzalez.

"And he's blowing / perfect smoke rings / up into the air"

Dan Nicoletta's photographs in 'Modern Primitives' were my first introduction to Mike.
This is another shot from his archive, posted with his permission :

You can find more of Dan's photographs of Mike by clicking here.

Moving on

The fantastic Efrain Gonzalez kindly sent in the following photographs and note :

"These were taken at the party
Tattoo Love Child
in NOHO on Layfitte Street"

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Click on photos to see them in full size.

You can see more of Efrain's work at Hellfirepress.com

Snite Museum of Art to exhibit a photograph of Wilson

Link to original article here.

Coney Island's Tattoo Man was living work of art

By Judie Glave

   A sideshow performer who fascinated Coney Island audiences with his tattoo-covered body - and the occasional nail through his tongue - was found dead in his apartment in New York.
 Michael Wilson, known as the Tattoo Man, apparently had been dead for a couple of days when he was found Wednesday. An autopsy was inconclusive, but Wilson, 44, was a severe diabetic who needed daily insulin shots and had frequent seizures.
   The circular swirls, star bursts, skulls and daggers that covered 90 percent of Wilson's body, including his face and hands, were of his own creation, Dick Zigun, his friend and sometime employer, said Friday.
   "There were no stupid biker tattoos for Michael," Zigun said. "He never went into a tattoo artist's shop and said, 'Gimme that one.' He would create each design and say, 'This is what I want."
   Zigun said it appeared Wilson had fallen - perhaps from a seizure - and never woke up: "He clearly had a bad injury on his head."
   Wilson - tall, bald and covered in blue, black, red and green art - moved to New York from San Francsico in 1986 because he could not find a tattoo artist who would ink his face.
   "Michael made a real commitment to this," Zigun said. "He couldn't go home at the end of the day and change his clothes and change the way he looked; that was his commitment, his artwork, his life."
   He had worked on and off at the Coney Island USA sideshow for the past 10 years, Zigun said.
   Dressed in a tuxedo, gloves and hood, Wilson wouls slowly strip down to his undershorts during sideshow performances, Zigun said. He also worked the sideshow's bed of nails, often encouraging members of the audience - the larger, the better - to stand on top of him.
   One of Wilson's favorite acts was actually an illusion.
   "He would hammer nails through his tongue," Zigun said, "but what the audience didn't know was that he already had his tongue pierced".
   He also appeared recently in a few music videos and modeling layouts.

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Article found here.

A Boardwalk Snap

From the Journal of Bison Jack

Maya & Mike, Coney Island

Photographed by Danny Clinch.
Some of these shots were featured in Tattoo Ink magazine.

Extra special thanks to Maya Ventura !

With Robert Sherman

Photographed by Len Price.

Through Bern Boyle's eyes

Bern Boyle (1951-1992) took these three pictures, but I can't seem to find a precise date.

From what I know, these two are from 1988 :

and this one from 1989 :

They do look like they were taken on the same sitting but who knows?
Great shots.

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Photographs from The Body : Visual AIDS Web Gallery

Photograph by Chris Wroblewski

Photo scanned from a tattoo book that I once borrowed from a teacher.
The caption ran something along the lines of :
Michael Wilson - Coney Island, New York
1989

Mike with Carmel, at Pink Tarantula

Mike photographed with Carmel at her Pink Tarantula salon in San Francisco by Dan Nicoletta

Homage to Diane Arbus' portrait of Jack Dracula

March 19, 1987
Photographed by Dan Nicoletta

Jack Dracula, The Marked Man, 1961
Photographed by Diane Arbus

Silver bangles

Circa 1976, San Francisco CA

Photographed by  Dan Nicoletta