Tattoos with experimental designs are going to make a huge trend among youngsters in the coming time, says 27-year-old tattoo artist Moranngam Khaling, better known as Mo Naga, who was accredited as the best tattoo artist by Lee Jeans when he started in 2009. Since then he has come a long way. His tattoo art studio in Hauz Khas village is a must visit for many tattoo-crazy youngsters. But it’s not just business for Mo. He, in fact, moved back to his home state a month ago to start the first official tattoo training institute, Headhunters’ Ink Tattoo School, in North-East India to revive the art of the head-hunters.
Mo, who is a graduate of National Institute of Fashion Technology, has been running a tattoo parlour in New Delhi since the year 2008. After setting up the school in Guwahati and finishing most of the formalities, he was recently in the capital. During a conversation, he tells us that though he studied fashion, tattoo art started interesting him more than fashion.
“When I started my parlour, I wanted to give the best deal and thus I started studying about tattoo art. I discovered that Indian tattoo art has a story and origination of its own, in states like Gujarat, Rajasthan and Nagaland but we have not been able to make a brand out of it as the Chinese, Japanese and Americans,” says Mo, who is now on the path of making Indian tattoo art popular. He has recently done a traditional Naga tattoo on an English couple. The design that he made is an original design of the Khoi Bo community of the Nagas and is inspired by a bee called Khoi Nang. “The interesting past is that every Indian traditional tattoo design has a story behind it. I’m reading about all such stories in all the tattoo cultures to get a better grip on the art,” he says.