According to a study conducted by the public opinion institute YouGov for the German news agency dpa, one in five adults in Germany has a tattoo. At the same time, tattoos are more popular among women than among men: 25 percent versus 16 percent. There are trends and correlations by age: more than 40 percent of women aged 25 to 45 have a tattoo, while among men aged 25 to 35 only 24 percent have permanent drawings on their bodies.
Tattoos: from notoriety to self-identification
For comparison: in 2012, according to polls, there were half as many tattooed Germans. In recent years, not only the number of tattooed people has changed, but also the general attitude towards this culture. Tattoos no longer evoke associations with sailors or the underworld. More than a quarter of German adults find tattoos “beautiful” or “very beautiful”. “Absolutely ugly” they consider only 12 percent of respondents. At the same time, the attitude among women is more positive than among men (32 percent versus 21). The younger generation is especially fond of tattoos: 43 percent of respondents aged 18 to 25 voted “nice” or “very nice”. Tattoos are usually opposed by people over 55 years of age.
Elmar Brähler, emeritus professor of psychology at the University of Leipzig, commented on a similar 2017 study: bodies are considered interesting, colorful personalities that show their belonging to a particular social group.
The pandemic has also affected the tattoo business
During the pandemic, the tattoo business has suffered significant losses. How true are the suspicions that tattoo culture is about to decline? Ada Borkenhagen, a writer, psychologist and lecturer at the University of Magdeburg, says the survey data suggests that the tattoo trend in Germany has stabilized. However, she notes that the last two years of the pandemic have been difficult for the service industry, including for tattoo studios: many sessions have been canceled or postponed, and “catching up with pre-corona indicators will not be so fast.”
Madame Unikat, founder of the UNIKAT salon in Berlin, spoke with DW about the tattoo business after the pandemic: “After the first lockdown, we had a lot of backlogs. pandemics. Only a few people haven’t gotten tattoos yet because they’re abroad.”
In one of Jena’s salons, June 2022
Madame Unikat notes that the pandemic has completely changed the tattoo industry: “Business has been very hard hit and will not return to what it was before the corona. Many artists left the studios and began to work privately to somehow compensate for financial losses.” The ban on the use of colored ink for tattooing, adopted on January 4, 2022, also hit business. Reason: The European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) reported that about 4,000 chemicals that make up permanent paints are potentially hazardous to health, can cause cancer and even genetic mutations.
The Mistake of Youth: Are Tattoos Forever?
Interestingly, during the pandemic, the demand for tattoo removal has increased. Claus Hasenkamp, head of tattoo removal parlor Reinhaut in Cologne, told DW that tattoo parlors were closed during the lockdown, but tattoo removal parlors continued to operate because they were treated as medical facilities and were not part of the industry. services. “With age, many begin to evaluate their tattoos as a mistake of youth and decide to get rid of them. I am sure that we will have enough work for many years,” Klaus is sure. At the same time, according to the expert, women not only get tattoos more often, but also remove tattoos more often. At Reinhaut, approximately 80 percent of customers are women.
However, according to the results of another YouGov poll (from 2019), 61 percent of tattooed Germans do not regret the decision to get a tattoo. At the same time, men in Germany are more likely to regret stuffed tattoos than women. Approximately half of the men who change their minds want to remove the image.
Tattoo trends now
Madame Unikat says most of her studio’s clients are between 25 and 35 years old. “They usually prefer minimalistic abstract images that organically fit into the curves of the body. Moreover, the masters most often work in the freehand technique, without using a stencil, focusing on the details with the help of dotwork. Another popular trend (I call it New Tribal) is the return to the gothic and metal aesthetic of the 1990s,” notes Madame Unikat.
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