Looking at the poster promoting Tom Kipp’s upcoming show, you’ll notice this peculiar description: “An exercise in willful self-motivation disguised an art show.”

It’s one part pure, oozing, Tom Kipp humility, a hesitance in labeling himself an artist, and one part a statement of fact: The show was designed as a kick in the pants of sorts for Kipp, a tattooer by trade. It was a net he intentionally tangled himself in, knowing the only way out was through discipline and dedication. The show is a concrete reason to do something he’s always wanted to do, to take some of the tattoo imagery and designs swirling in his head and paint them big.

“To have an art show makes me an artist,” Kipp said, calling the show an offering to the tattoo gods, likening his work to studies more than fine art. “This is more like practice.”

A lot of practice, indeed. Eighteen of Kipp’s 24-inch by 36-inch watercolors will be on display at Lost Dog Bar & Lounge through Aug. 21, with an opening reception from 7 to 9 p.m. Thursday. The paintings, which Kipp began in February, are laden with tattoo imagery and are designed as life-sized traditional male and female back pieces.

Not only is Kipp uneasy with the term “artist” (though many who see Kipp’s paintings would undoubtedly disagree), the owner of the year-old Conductor Tattoo is not even comfortable calling himself a “tattoo artist.” In his eyes, he’s more of a commissioned craftsman, where someone comes in with an idea for a tattoo and he does his best to transfer the idea onto skin.

“There’s really not much difference between what I do and what a carpenter does or even what a mechanic would do,” Kipp said. “There’s tattoos I do that I don’t consider art, and there’s others that very much look like art.”

At times, Kipp looks at his artist friends’ work, envious of their talent. The ever humble Kipp looks at his designs and feels like anyone could do what he does.

“People dig what I do,” he said, “but I don’t look at it that way.”

At home, Kipp will admit, is where he feels like the artist, working whatever hours he pleases, early or late. It’s where he feels the most freedom, where the surface of his work isn’t someone else’s flesh.

“A canvas never goes into shock; a canvas doesn’t ever start bleeding too much,” he said. “Watercolor paper, you can definitely push it. “

The 39-year-old Kipp has been tattooing professionally for nearly 20 years, most recently at Your Flesh in Durango before opening Conductor last year. Kipp’s shop is just as busy visually as his skin. Populated symmetrically, the walls are full of flash (simple, traditional tattoo designs), antlers, an old cash register, masks, his own artwork and some of his friends’, images torn from magazines, anything to make the shop “tattoo-y,” a place where his clients will be sitting for hours at a time.

Like any tattooer, his skin is covered, having gotten his first tattoo at 17 and adding on since. In that time he’s seen it all. He’s seen tattoos go from being associated with bikers, convicts and sailors to wildly popular television shows celebrating and promoting tattoo culture to the masses. He has seen trends come and go and come back again, shifts in attitude Kipp celebrates. Conversely, thanks to the Internet, the access to tattooing equipment has become easier, with tattoo instruction available to anyone on YouTube, a stark contrast to how Kipp broke into the business, fighting hard for an apprenticeship and access to equipment.

“You had to walk into a shop and get kicked out six times before that guy would be like, ‘Alright, let’s talk,’” he said. “Every time you’d ask for an apprenticeship it’s like, ‘beat it, kid. Get out of here.’ It was kind of sacred.”

Now, the stigma on tattoos is mostly gone and Kipp is torn. With the prevalence, acceptance and popularity comes a loss in quality control and a lot of bad tattoos, home jobs, infections, you name it.

Kipp is also hesitant about some nontraditional techniques he sees or is asked to execute. While traditional tattoos are black outline and shading with limited lettering, nontraditional tattoos popular now have a watercolor effect without a definitive outline. Decades from now, Kipp fears many of these tattoos “might look like a bruise. Or a skin disease.”

Mostly, however, Kipp is grateful he is busy at work, grateful for the life tattooing has afforded him, eager to see where tattoo culture goes from here.

But for now, it’s all about the show, this exercise in willful self motivation. Echoing that peculiar phrase on the poster is the dominant image, a Japanese Daruma doll. As the tradition goes, a Daruma is a motivator: When you set a goal, you set the doll on a shelf, giving only one of its eyes a pupil. When the goal is completed, the other pupil is filled in.

The Daruma on Kipp’s poster has just one pupil. It’s time to give it another.

dholub@durangoherald.com.

If you go

Tom Kipp’s tattoo-inspired watercolors will be on display at Lost Dog Bar & Lounge (1150 Main Ave, Durango) through Aug. 21, with an opening reception from 7 to 9 p.m. Thursday. For more information, call 259-0430.