Tattoos always fascinated me, and, after incorporating them into my art, I felt the need to go into the subject more deeply by becoming a tattooist myself, which led, in the mid 1970s, to an apprenticeship with Buddy McFall and Dale Grande at Cliff Raven's old shop on Belmont Avenue in Chicago.

As a tattooist, my aesthetics overshadowed my technical ability, but I held my own. By the 1980, tattooing had become a dead end for me, and I returned to fine art, which moved me on a deeper and more personal level. I retrospect, I could consider myself a 'George Plimpton of tattooing.'