8 Simple Wendigo Tattoo Ideas And Designs With Meanings
Striking pieces of body art showcasing the dreadful charm of these fabled monsters.
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A wendigo tattoo is ideal for those leaning towards dark philosophies or gothic designs. This creature with its sickly, skeletal, human-like body, and a twisted, rotting face challenges all other creatures of horror. It represents the darkest nature of a human soul. This tattoo is known to make people reflect on the harsh realities of life and keep them from turning evil. It also offers a huge scope for experimenting with its form and artistic style. In this article, we have listed a few popular wendigo tattoo ideas for you to choose from. Continue reading to awaken your philosophical side.
In This Article
Wendigo Tattoo Meaning
The wendigo is a supernatural creature with roots in native North American indigenous cultures, specifically among the Algonquian people. It is generally described as a gaunt, skeletal humanoid creature with its ashen, thin, loose flesh sticking close to its protruding bones. However, these features are not well-defined except for their characteristic large branching antlers. In native legends, the monster is said to indulge in cannibalism due to its insatiable hunger, thus representing unending greed, strong desires, and an instinct to turn toward destructive methods to satisfy itself. The fact that the wendigo continues to be a gaunt figure despite its feeding on humans, speaks of how deep its hunger runs.
As a tattoo, a wendigo could represent the darkest aspects of a human or the physical form of a transformatory phase in one’s life where the good within one is seemingly getting overpowered by the evil in them. It serves as a reminder of what one can resort to when faced with endless hardships and the importance of being more cautious so that survival methods do not stoop to such desperate measures.
A wendigo tattoo can represent all of the above and more depending on the personal beliefs and ideologies of the wearer. It can be designed in multiple creative ways and the following section shares some images and ideas for the same. Keep scrolling to check them out.
8 Wendigo Tattoo Ideas
The wendigo is the perfect tattoo subject for gothcore enthusiasts looking for an element to represent the darkness or duality of the human psyche. Check out the following tattoo designs for some creative ideas to design your own wendigo tattoo.
1. Wendigo Skull Tattoo
A wendigo with a human or animal skull and large imposing antlers is perhaps the most popular rendition of this terrifying creature. The above tattoo features an animal skull wendigo with a human skull beneath it, presented like an altar. The use of black, gray, and white ink allows for a wide range of depth and light and shadow play in the design. The thigh placement does justice to the tattoo details, allowing more canvas space.
2. Traditional Wendigo Tattoo
While opting for a traditional tattooing technique for your wendigo tattoo, you may explore a few palette options. The more popular type is one with bold outlines, bright colors, and sharp blending or shading. However, a silhouette-style tattoo works best in keeping with the dark, horror theme of the wendigo. The above tattoo shows a wendigo in its full glory with antlers sprouting out of its body at random. It paints a daunting picture that can give anyone goosebumps.
3. Wendigo Head Tattoo
While imagining an overall silhouette of a wendigo through the mists in a forest can have a blood-curdling effect, a close-up of its head and face can become the object of recurring nightmares. If that is the effect you are looking for, take cues from the tattoo above. The antlers are on the shorter side but the details of the wrinkly, sunken face, jutting cheekbones, and glowing red eyes add all the charisma to the tattoo, making for a stupefying piece.
4. Wendigo Tattoo Sleeve
A wendigo can represent rot, decay, and abject desperation during unparalleled hardships. But it also hints at the growth of a completely new entity that arises, stronger from all the desperation. This can be presented beautifully in a full-sleeve wendigo tattoo as shown in the image above. A skeletal wendigo with towering antlers seems to be blooming alongside wildflowers, painting a contrasting tale.
5. Wendigo Chest Tattoo
The chest area tattoo placement can speak of a deep symbolism as well as pose as a smart choice for artistic freedom in implementing the tattoo. Due to its proximity to the heart, it can represent the deep emotions or ideologies of the wearer. The skull in this tattoo dips downward toward the sternum, while the antlers branch out towards the collarbones and shoulders. The shape of the wendigo is a perfect way to narrate your relationship with the best of the dark.
6. Tribal Wendigo Tattoo
The wendigo is a creation of native or tribal beliefs and hence, it might be most ideal and natural to illustrate it in tribal styles. The tribal tattoo in the image above can give you some ideas. The face of the wendigo is fashioned like a mask which is an object frequently observed in tribal customs, while the antlers are given sharp curved and pointed shapes, resembling the brambles at the bottom. The wildflowers have a rough shape as well, contributing to the overall organic feel of the tattoo style.
7. Wendigo Back Tattoo
The traditional wendigo tattoo in this image is the perfect instance of using a wide space for a boldly detailed tattoo. It features an upper back tattoo of a wendigo head, replete with sunken cheeks, gaunt eyes, skeletal jawline, and rough hair. The antlers are cleverly designed to climb up the nape, keeping the space in mind. Experiment with different color palettes for a tattoo that feels more relatable to your moods or beliefs.
8. Hannibal Wendigo Tattoo
This Hannibal-inspired wendigo tattoo features a human in the process of transforming into a wendigo, just like Will Graham would envision the transformation of Hannibal Lecter in the books. The hair on the crown is still quite polished-looking which gives away the Hannibal reference. You can personalize this tattoo by going for a human face of your choice to represent the person who may have a similar, or relative influence on your life.
And that was our list of bone-chilling yet attractive wendigo tattoo designs and ideas. Although wendigo represents monstrous greed often not associated with human nature, it can also represent a transformative phase where a person’s inner good and evil are warring among themselves. It serves as a reminder of what one is doomed to become if they do not check their ways. Be it a basic silhouette form, or a fully detailed, realistic figure of the wendigo, a tattoo of this creature is sure to draw eyes and stir the imagination and curiosity of most people. We hope this article helped and you get to try out our ideas and play around with the concept to draft yourself a suitable wendigo tattoo. Cheers!
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