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In order to get a puhoro [poo’-ho-ro—accent on first syllable, u as in ‘moon,’ o’s as in ‘more’, r from the back of the throat, slightly rolled], it must first be drawn on your body, usually in sections, each section inked before the next section is drawn.

I stand on the tattoo table, so my mid-section is face-level for Rangi Kipa and Phil Hoskin. Since this tattoo goes from the knees to the natural waist, they need access to my entire pelvic area, including my buttocks, inner thighs, upper thighs, lower belly. So, for Rangi and Phil, I pose naked, stand in my briefs, which they often pull up into a thong, or in a posing strap/g-string, or totally nude for Mark Dwyer, who is making a documentary about my tattoo journey, sometimes with my hand cupping my junk to get an R-rating.

My body is constantly on display, directed into different positions, as if I were the nude model for a life drawing class. But the drawing, in this case, is actually being done on my body.

Their water-proof markers sketch and draw. I feel the short sketching strokes, the longer glides of drawn curves. Up my legs, through my inner thighs, around my buttocks. Rangi and Phil rest their hands and forearms on my body to steady the drawing hand, sometimes hold my body with their other hand to steady themselves or me. For curves on my lower belly, Rangi rested his hand at the base of my penis. They erase with isopropyl alcohol on a towel, so I feel cool, wet wiping strokes, too, all over the most intimate parts of my body. And then, they re-draw.

When they are satisfied with the lines on my body, I lie down. And Phil uses the inking gun to sew the drawn lines into my skin in black ink.

I lie on my stomach, on my side, twisted this way and that, on my back, sometimes with one leg drawn up and rotated out to give them access to my inner thigh.

This is figurative art—the application of an intricate 2D pattern onto the complicated 3D geometry of the legs and pelvis, belly and lower back. The art is on my body, but would be in the shape of my body, even if my body were somehow removed.

Figurative art—like a portrait, or a nude, or an haute-couture sketch. Like a Greek statue.

It is graphic design, too. It is drawing, with shading. It is carving. It is sculpture.

And it’s a mobile, since it moves, everywhere, with my body. Like a second skin, or magical clothing.

I see this art when I look at my body.

But I also occupy this art.

I live inside it.

The application of the design to the outside of my body, changes the perception of its contours. Hence sculpture.

But this art, on the outside of my body, also changes my interior space. Changes how I feel about myself, and my body. How I see myself.

On the inside.

When the inking of my legs had just been completed, when I first took my clothes off, I was surprised, as if I still had another layer to remove.

When I looked at my new body in the mirror, it made me smile.

I stood tall, legs spread. Chest up, shoulders back.

I felt fierce.

This puhoro gives figurative art a much broadened meaning. Layer upon layer of meaning.