Nancy the Elephant

Nancy the Elephant got some INK and said goodbye to the circus…

Not many people that walk through the doors of Sith Tattoo Studio could endure 3 weeks of relentless work being adorned on their skin without so much as a flinch, but then, Nancy is no ordinary customer… Nancy is a fibreglass elephant!

Founder and chief tattoo artist at Sith, Rytch, was approached by Wild in Art and The Forum Trust to paint a Welsh dragon onto a plain 120cm tall, 170cm long elephant for their Go Elephants event. The event sees 50 of these elephants, plus over 100 smaller ones being painted by local celebrities, artists, schools and community groups and displayed all around the city, creating an ‘Urban Safari’. At the end of the event, the elephants will be auctioned off, with 75% of the proceeds going to the Born Free Foundation, an international wildlife conservation charity.

Rytch, who has been tattooing for 10 years, and has been in situe at Sith for 3 years, explains his interpretation of the brief; “I wanted to redesign the Welsh dragon and make it badass!” And badass it is – with a ferocious, flaming red dragon and decorative daffodils up its trunk, plus Rytch’s twist, a demon tearing through Nancy’s underbelly, it is sure to be one of the biggest attractions in the herd. Rytch writes in his artist statement for the Go Elephants project that for his art, he likes to “use literally anything I can find as a medium. But my chosen favourite is human skin. Yes, I am a tattooist, and have been for 10 years. I am a member of the world wide tattoo artists fellowship, which is an organisation formed of international tattoo artists with one goal in mind; raising the standard and profile of tattooing as an art form.