Photographed by Mel D. Cole
This June we celebrate Pride and Juneteenth, two holidays that employ and embrace strength in the face of injustice. Pride is a holiday that triumphs celebratory love and Juneteenth, the oldest national holiday commemorating emancipation from slavery in the United States honors Black culture, achievements and the freedom to be.
At Stashed, we’re celebrating Black Queer creatives who are trailblazers in the creative industry, whose stories are awe-inspiring.
“It’s okay if you don’t accept me, because I’m gonna accept myself at the end
of the day,” – Tann Parker
Tattoo Artist Tann Parker has made plenty of headlines in the last year. Their mission?
“[To] always inspire other dark skin people to get tattoos, and to shake off the stigma that you’re too ‘dark’ to get a tattoo.”
Photographed by Mel D. Cole
Tann set up the platform “Ink The Diaspora,” a living platform on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter that gives visibility to dark-skinned people who are not represented in the tattoo world. Tann’s Instagram page has roughly 40K followers, and is growing day by day.
For them, it’s pertinent that the industry doesn’t see dark skin as a challenge, and that everyone, no matter how dark their skin, can reclaim their body with tattoos.
“I’m not really here to serve a popular opinion, or be palatable to people,” they state; rather they aim to fulfill their life with their passion for tattoos and inter-community work that’ll live on for generations.
