Get Inked at the Philadelphia Tattoo Arts Convention This Weekend

Or just go to gawk.

Photo from Facebook/Philadelphia Tattoo Arts Convention

Photo from Facebook/Philadelphia Tattoo Arts Convention

Searching for a place to get your sweetie’s name tattooed above your heart in time for Valentine’s Day? You’re in luck. The 19th annual Philadelphia Tattoo Arts Convention opens Friday and runs all weekend at the Pennsylvania Convention Center.

If you actually want to get a tattoo, you can either just show up or make an appointment with one of the artists beforehand. This seems like the type of thing you’d want to do a little research into first, but I got my sole tattoo on a whim in a beach town in another country, so I’m definitely not an expert. Winners and finalists from several seasons of the reality TV show Ink Master will be there, along with competitors from LA Ink, Best Ink, Tattoo Nightmares and Tattoo Rescue, a handful of porn stars, and artists demonstrating Japanese hand poke tattooing, which is pretty cool to watch. If that’s not exciting enough for you, you can watch people do awful things with hooks in the “live human suspension” performance from Ascension Suspension instead.

Comedy contortionist and daredevil Alakazam the Human Knot will be at the convention.

Comedy contortionist and daredevil Alakazam the Human Knot will be at the convention.

Other sideshow-style acts include Alakazam the Human Knot, The Enigma, strongman Titano Oddfellow, and burlesque troupes. There will also be vendors selling clothes and jewelry, painters creating works onsite, and seminars geared toward the tattoo artists.

Tickets for the convention are only being sold at the door. Admission is $22, or $45 for a three-day pass. The kick-off party is tonight, February 9th, at — where else? — Tattooed Mom on South Street. On Friday, the after-party is at Underground Arts, where Tragedy will be playing the metal/Bee Gees mash-up you didn’t realize you’ve been missing from your life.

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