Proper Terms in Leather Working
I get pretty pissy when it comes to people who try to "redefine" terms in leather working so that they can better market their products.
The latest example: A person calls pyrography a "cue tattoo" by choosing that moniker as the name of a service he offers.
Pyrography and Tattooing are separate art forms and when a person uses one to define the other he is diluting both.
This is pyrography in it's highest form:
http://www.suewalters.com/
http://pyromuse.org/dino.html
These artists would not want to be called wood tattooists. They have perfected the art of shading wood and leather and what they do is not similar to tattooing at all.
Tattooing is the art of injecting INK into the skin cells. It is a precise endeavor that has nothing whatsoever to do with burning the leather.
Both of these techniques are used to create some amazing work and some not so inspiring work. Like all art forms there is the mundane "tourist trap" quickie versions and then there are the pieces that take your breath away.
And neither should be confused with the other.
I find it morally unethical for anyone to deliberately blur that line.
Another one that galls me are the people who say that the work is "tooled" when it is embossed. Tooled as used in leather working circles is synonymous with HAND tooled. Meaning that the decorator did the work using their hands and was not mechanically assisted.
Embossed is when the decorator uses a rolling plate or a press to imprint the image onto the leather.
Laser engraving is when you use a computer controlled laser beam to burn the image onto the leather. It's not "tooled".
All of these techniques are perfectly legitimate ways to decorate leather and each can be done with a high degree of skill or quite sloppily. Only the customers who study the methods can appreciate the differences.
Which is part of why so many people like to use the wrong term to describe how they decorate the leather. They either want to cover up one method by insinuating that another method was used that is perceived to be of higher value. Or they want to simplify the description so that people can understand the work easier.
Which wouldn't be a problem if the creator of the "Cue Tattoo" would have simply said that his technique is like a tattoo in that it makes a permanent mark on dead animal skin instead of also NAMING his product the "Cue Tattoo".
I understand marketing, I have been in this business for 20 years. I understand the difference between naming a product and the literal meaning of the words. This is not about that, it's about blurring lines in art forms that shouldn't be and don't need to be blurred.
Please, just use proper terms.
It's better for the artists and better for the consumers.
The latest example: A person calls pyrography a "cue tattoo" by choosing that moniker as the name of a service he offers.
Pyrography and Tattooing are separate art forms and when a person uses one to define the other he is diluting both.
This is pyrography in it's highest form:
http://www.suewalters.com/
http://pyromuse.org/dino.html
These artists would not want to be called wood tattooists. They have perfected the art of shading wood and leather and what they do is not similar to tattooing at all.
Tattooing is the art of injecting INK into the skin cells. It is a precise endeavor that has nothing whatsoever to do with burning the leather.
Both of these techniques are used to create some amazing work and some not so inspiring work. Like all art forms there is the mundane "tourist trap" quickie versions and then there are the pieces that take your breath away.
And neither should be confused with the other.
I find it morally unethical for anyone to deliberately blur that line.
Another one that galls me are the people who say that the work is "tooled" when it is embossed. Tooled as used in leather working circles is synonymous with HAND tooled. Meaning that the decorator did the work using their hands and was not mechanically assisted.
Embossed is when the decorator uses a rolling plate or a press to imprint the image onto the leather.
Laser engraving is when you use a computer controlled laser beam to burn the image onto the leather. It's not "tooled".
All of these techniques are perfectly legitimate ways to decorate leather and each can be done with a high degree of skill or quite sloppily. Only the customers who study the methods can appreciate the differences.
Which is part of why so many people like to use the wrong term to describe how they decorate the leather. They either want to cover up one method by insinuating that another method was used that is perceived to be of higher value. Or they want to simplify the description so that people can understand the work easier.
Which wouldn't be a problem if the creator of the "Cue Tattoo" would have simply said that his technique is like a tattoo in that it makes a permanent mark on dead animal skin instead of also NAMING his product the "Cue Tattoo".
I understand marketing, I have been in this business for 20 years. I understand the difference between naming a product and the literal meaning of the words. This is not about that, it's about blurring lines in art forms that shouldn't be and don't need to be blurred.
Please, just use proper terms.
It's better for the artists and better for the consumers.
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