Welcome to Needled—site of the very finest tattoo art and video on the planet. Come on in and take a look…we bet you won’t stop at just one. Tattoo is not a fad. It’s not a fashion. It’s a passion. It’s an art. It’s a lifestyle. Needled understands tattoo because we live it. We know that body art aficionados cannot be put into neat boxes: they are lawyers with tattooed bodysuits under Armani suits, tech gurus with backpieces, and soccer moms with sleeves. They are tattoo virgins considering a first piece, collectors working on their twentieth, and those just visiting for the sheer fascination of it all.
Drill down into Needled’s exceptional library of original video covering the world’s most amazing artists, shops, and shows. Check out our gallery of fine art tattoos. Peruse the artist and shop pages packed with contact information and profiles. Explore the histories that detail the roots of virtually every tattoo genre. We have it all covered, and then some, including personal adornment by the best tattoo artists in the world.
Also, be sure to check out our infamous Needled blog, written daily from her Belgian outpost by our very own tattooed muse, Marisa DiMattia. With an edgy look at the fine art and culture of the world of tattoos, she covers artist profiles, event listings, convention news, tattoo’s impact on society, and more.
Needled. High brow for the underground. Tattoo couture.
Marisa Kakoulas DiMattia, co-founder and editor of Needled.com, is a heavily tattooed New York attorney and
writer with such a passion for the art that some -- ok, many -- have deemed her a "tattoo nerd."
After visiting an underground East Village tattoo studio at the age of 17 in 1990, she discovered
tattooing as a fine art rather than rebellion, even though her first pieces were pre-legalization
of the art in NYC. Since then, she's acquired two sleeves, a backpiece, rib and stomach work (among
other tattoos) from acclaimed blackwork specialist Daniel DiMattia of Calypso Tattoo in Belgium
(her former husband and lifelong friend). Marisa also has art from Tim Kern, Anil Gupta, Mike
Bellamy and hand-tattooed Thai work from Peter of Lard Yao Tattoo. More to come.
Marisa writes for industry media including Inked mag, Suicide Girls, Skin & Ink, as well as mainstream
publications such as Glamour, Salon, Bust, Budget Travel, among many others. She also holds an MS in
journalism from Columbia Universitys School of Journalism.
Considered an expert in modern tattoo culture, she has been written about in Time Magazine, the NY Times,
the NY Times Magazine, Philadelphia Inquirer, Denver Post, International Herald Tribune, Milwaukee Journal
Sentinel, San Francisco Chronicle, and many other popular newspapers, magazines, and online media. In fact,
Needled was a Yahoo Pick, featured on AOL TV, and MSNBCs Clicked. Moreover, Marisa has been profiled in
almost every major tattoo magazine worldwide.
Her goal is to see custom tattooing risen generally accepted as a fine art.
