Sue Ann and I’ve been dancing together for close to ten years. When she asked me to design her first tattoo I was beyond excited. I mean, imagine someone who you admire (for many reasons) asks you to make art that they will see for the rest of their life, every day…Right? She wanted text “Dance like the world is watching. Make it count”, and an idea of the dancer’s body position. Our collaboration was pure joy. It was an organic process and one where I wanted to be sure the design was exactly what she wanted.

She took the final design (image on the right) to a local tattoo artist who traced the design perfectly (image on the left). Now, I get to dance with both Sue Ann and our design in the studio.

Sue Ann is a co-founder of Tint Dance Festival. Their mission: ‘Tint Dance Festival’s Mission is to provide dance performance opportunities where choreographers and dancers of color are represented and celebrated on stage and artists of color have space to tell their stories with bodies that are representative of the truths they are sharing.’