Most thought that there would be no Amsterdam convention in 96 , however the opening of the Amsterdam Tattoo Museum by Henk Schiffmacher would surely attract a lot of top rate artists to the area at the same time, and the museum could use the support, so it would be. The artists working this show came from all over. Tebori by Horiwaka and his Deishi (apprentices) spellbound the audience and other artists alike. Henk Schiffmacher's convention savy put together top rate artists from across the globe and the atmosphere was wild, carefree , anything goes, and in Amsterdam ANYTHING goes. Long a favorite port of sailor's to get "stewed , screwed and tattooed". Amsterdam is a den of sin ( and this is a good thing) now as it always has been. 

The convention was held at the "Beurs van Berlage", a convention center sitting right on the edge of the infamous Amsterdam red light district. There people from across the globe of all ages, sex, and color gather to drink, smoke,  walk the canals and do whatever else you feel like doing. The cafes provide the tourists with a small laid back place to relax  with friends or natives, my favorite became the Sheeba, a small shop with friendly staff and no techno dance music that seemed to fill my ears everywhere else. 

On the convention floor people milled about smoking and discussing art and artist's. The tattoo work gave folks alot to discuss. A video wall at center stage played taped footage documenting Hanky Panky's travells through a large multitude of countries in which traditional tattooing is still practiced. Henk showed us much of the tribal world through his eyes, in Borneo, Samoa, French Polynesia and Japan. It is an accurate testament as to the consistent symbolism of life and death , unfortunately a great  amount of the tape was in Dutch with English sub-titles, as is Henk's book on his travels through Borneo, he is currently seeking an english publisher.

In other areas we saw Bernie Luther, of Austria and Filip Leu, of Leu's Family Irons in Lausanne , Switzerland was doing his usual magic and planned on staying in Amsterdam to work as a guest artist at the Amsterdam Tattoo Museum .

   Filip and Titine are tattoo ambassadors, the attitude that one often encounters speaking with some "popular" tattooists is no where to be seen. It is of paramount importance to understand that honest love of tattooing and the art that carries it to new heights must be shared and not horded, and that is a philisophy that eminates from Filip Leu , not so much in words , but actions. Other artists doing knock out work at the show included Marcus Pacheco, Eddy Deutche, Tony Olivas, Bugs (Evil from the Needle), Rattattoo, Tattoo Alien, Igor Mortis, Tom Tattoo, Endless Pain and many others. Even famous artist's like Tin-Tin of France could be seen bouncing from booth to booth watching other artists work and discussing the different forms or maybe which parties to attend that night. After the ink was done for the day , there is always a party in Amsterdam, and it can last all night if you choose, but the amount of serious ink work going on is also tiresome and at the close of the convention most artist's looked like they had just climbed a small mountain. 

Henk started the whole show early with a party at the Milk Weg (Milky Way) on the fiday night to celebrate the opening of the Amsterdam Tattoo Museum, with the exception of the open smoking and the fact that one must fork over a guilder for the privilage of urinating inside , this could quite easily have been a typical north american night club. However the club goers looked a little different than one is used to, these are the paparazzi of ink and as such one comes to expect the usual "convention-ware" bright shades of green and red dreds reflect under the club lights, platform shoes and patent leather pants abound. Most folks are pierced in almost every place you can think of, and bright color tattoos are popping up on the side of necks as an ink industry trademark of the nineties, in fact the most popular question between people at the show was , when are going to get your neck tattooed? or in my case, when will you have it finished?? The Sunday night closing party was much the same only the crowd did not carry the expectant aura of the party that preceded the convention, instead everyone seemed to want to wind down and just relax until they were ready to take there leave. This is exactly what yours truly and fellow Tattoos.Com writer/photographer Stu Kay did. After all the booths were torn down and the machines stopped buzzing there was still the museum , with enough tattoo history that one could spend all day just taking in the exhibits, if you are gonna be in Amsterdam, don't miss out , stop by the museum and see for yourself why us tattoo enthusiasts travel oceans to get to see such things, like we been sayin' from the start at Tattoos.Com,"If your gonna go anywhere in the ink world , you better know where you came from."......DJM