Chickens are a domesticated bird that some people view only as a source of eggs and meat. Others like the personalities of these noisy, often colourful animals and engage with media and art that feature the chicken. Some people are even choosing to keep them as pets because these adventurous and lively animals are quite entertaining and have little fear of people when raised among us.
And then there are those who choose to have these tasty birds inked into their skin for life as chicken tattoos. They walk among us…
Chickens as Art
Chickens have appeared in art works for centuries, even as far back as 2000 years ago, when the Romans celebrated their hens and roosters in mosaics and mural art. Chickens have appeared in art across the globe, from paintings and tapestries to ceramics and animation. Humanity’s love for this characterful bird means that many plucky people (I was surprised and tickled by just how many chicken tattoos there are) have chosen to get chickens and roosters tattooed into their skin; inking themselves for life with designs of this fun bird.
All of this chicken art has served as inspiration for tattoo artists to create chicken tattoo designs that are based on other art forms:
Hey Hey! It’s Heihei!
Heihei is a comical chicken character from Disney’s 3D animated movie, Moana. Heihei is the village idiot and accidentally joins Moana’s adventures, providing a lot of humor for this kids’ film. This colourful chicken features big, bulging eyes and brightly colored feathers that are generally scruffy-looking. Disney’s really good at combining lovability and idiocy in their cartoon characters and Heihei the chicken is no exception.
Seriously Chicken
The following tattoos have used more serious styles of design to give power to the chickens and roosters featured in the tattoos. Roosters can be quite vicious when protecting their flock of hens. The rooster is armed with a spur, which is basically a big, sharp talon on the back of their legs. When they attack, they raise their legs and use their claws and spurs to rake an opponent. Hens are less fearsome when fighting, but can still cause a lot of pain with their beaks and claws. The term “hen-pecked” refers to a hen that has been bullied by other hens who peck at her. In human relationships, the term is used to refer to someone who has been bullied by others, usually women.
These chickenĀ and rooster tattoos take the more dangerous, and sometimes darker aspects of chickens’ personalities into account by reflecting these more serious attitudes with serious design styles:
Void Chickens and Minecraft Hens
Void Chickens:
Void chickens exist in the pixellated game world of Stardew Valley, a farming game in which a player grows crops and raises livestock and then produces products to sell in the game. Tattoos based on game elements from Stardew Valley feature solid blocks (pixels) of saturated color inks.
Minecraft Hens:
Minecraft hens are blocky chickens that live in the 3D game world of Minecraft. They spawn naturally and players can build fences around them to farm them for food. The blocky nature of Minecraft’s interface give Minecraft hens a wide beak, resembling the flat bill of a duck rather than a pointy, tapering beak of a chicken. This just adds to the humorous appeal of the design, though. Because Minecraft hens are 3D, tattoo artists include shadows to give the illusion of three-dimensionality.
Did you like this article? Check out more articles about bird tattoos.