Rita Zolotukhina is a Lisbon-based tattoo artist who has a unique way of ensuring her clients get the best possible tattoo. Instead of going with traditional sketches, she opts for the “Live Leaf Tattoo” technique, which sees her using real flowers as tattoo stencils.
Zolotukhina invented her trademark technique in 2015, and it soon became the focus of her work as a tattoo artist. She takes a real flower, plant, or leaf and covers it with ink. After that, the inked imprint gets transferred directly from the plant onto the skin, resulting in detailed outlines, shapes, and shades. This allows her to directly replicate the flower to the skin with a tattoo machine in the slightest of details.
According to Zolotukhina, having a real flower in front of her as a guide allows for more realistic results than the use of photos and sketches would allow.
“I neither take images on the Internet nor prepare sketches beforehand, I’m just drawing the way it is, drawing from nature,” she explains on her website.
In most cases, Zolotukhina sources the flowers by herself. However, the customers can also bring the plants they like or deem special by themselves and get them forever imprinted on their skin.
You can check out more of her unique tattoos below.
