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Storytime with Dad. A solo trip to Oregon. The search for a thimble around Grandma’s house. The photo essay "Epheral Instants, Eternally Inked" follows UCLA students and faculty who seek to preserve precious, fleeting moments through their tattoos.
Tattoos can be a means of self-expression, helping people feel more comfortable with how they present themselves, said third-year philosophy student Mateen Bahai in April 2023. Bahai, who writes and produces music, has a tattoo on his waist that reads "blond/blonde," inspired by Frank Ocean’s 2016 studio album "Blonde."
Shekinah Lucas’ mushroom tattoo symbolizes her solo journey driving from Los Angeles to Oregon in 2021. The fourth-year psychology and sociology student initiated the trip as they dealt with the difficult transition of losing friends and moving back home.
Allison Wolfe holds a photo of her mother, whom she describes as a free-spirited and humorous lesbian feminist. A banner that reads "MOM" – in a traditional pattern that sailors would often get to remember loved ones at sea – is inked on Wolfe’s left arm crossing over a rose. Raised in an underground music scene, the lead singer of the punk band Bratmobile said many of her friends had already received tattoos by the time she decided to get her first one at 29 – the year she returned to Olympia, Washington, to care for her mother.
After her mom was diagnosed with terminal cancer, Wolfe was determined to keep a symbol of her. She said her mother died not long after she got the ink. Two decades later, the color of the tattoo has begun to wear off. Wolfe said she wonders if the memories of her mother will eventually fade the same way.
"I was 30 years old when my mom died. … Your life is never really the same, so that really commemorates that," Wolfe said. "Even the fact that it’s so faded sometimes makes me feel sad because you’re like, ‘Oh, do memories fade?’"
Avalon Sweetland’s first tattoo was a butterfly on their right forearm, paying tribute to their father who died when they were in high school. Sweetland’s father also had a butterfly tattoo flying between her first and middle name on his forearm. And while Sweetland’s tattoo commemorates their father, it also connects them to their mother, who was the first in the family to have a butterfly tattoo.
After the butterfly, more bugs followed. Sweetland now dons more than 30 tattoos, including a bee, a scorpion and a centipede. Expecting to get more tattoos inspired by their family, Sweetland said they believe tattoos are a unique way to honor important people in their life.
"It’s cool to pay tribute to other people," Sweetland said. "I love them, so I want them to be with me forever."
A tattoo on Austin Riggs’ left forearm is a protein structure dedicated to his grandfather. A former geneticist at City of Hope, an organization researching treatments for chronic conditions, Riggs’ grandfather helped synthesize the human genome for insulin.
Riggs said the tattoo honors his grandfather’s work, which not only advanced public health but also provided Riggs with opportunities to pursue higher education.
Tattoos are alsoa way of documenting nostalgic memories, Riggs said. The thimble tattoo under Riggs’ left thumb represents a game he used to play with his two younger sisters. They would take turns hiding and finding their grandmother’s thimble around the house in carefree and innocent times that he tried to capture in his tattoo.
Elizabeth Schiffler arrived outside a tattoo studio in Chinatown minutes before noon in April 2023. Eight years after she got her first lion, Schiffler plans to add two antelopes on her right upper arm. Drawn to the antelopes’ whimsical depictions, Schiffler said she now chooses some tattoos for their aesthetics rather than symbolisms.
Whether they simply decorate her body or carry deeper meanings, tattoos symbolize different stages of her life, Schiffler said.
"Each tattoo is always a marker of time," Schiffler said. "They show me that time has passed. And some things are tied to certain memories, or there might have been a reason I got it."