BOB PETRA

– WHO ?

Bob Petra is a Copenhagen based artist, tattooer and art facilitator, working in the space between rawness and sensitivity, the absurd and the sincere. Creativity began with beats and sound experiments in the teenage bedroom and has since evolved into a vast art-mixer of tattoos, collages, zines, exhibitions, and whatever weird format an idea demands.

"Nothing is too small, or too offbeat to matter".

At the core of it all: “fuck it, I’ll just do it myself.” 

That impulse runs through everything Bob Petra touches. It’s about acting without permission and creating without filters. Starting messy, staying honest and finding the beauty it all.

Since 2015, Bob Petra has worked with art facilitation, building platforms for voices and visuals that don’t fit into the institutionally approved frame. Through his work building Monday Studio and Art Monday, spaces have emerged for the experimental and the quietly powerful.

I'M NO HOMEGROWN SCRATCHER

"In tattooing i'm using the hand-poke technique – a precise, intimate, and deliberate method that stands in clear contrast to so-called “scratcher tattoos”.

This isn’t uneven lines poked with sewing needles at the kitchen table. This is craftsmanship - a slow and thoughtful approach to storytelling on skin.

The body is a canvas, ment to be exposed - an exploration of skin as language. Fantasy as resistance. Flesh that speaks in ink...

CREATIVE CHAOS?

A psychiatrist once said it: ADHD. It wasn’t a surprise – more like a moment of internal clarity. An explanation for a life lived in full volume, with signals firing in all directions. It doesn’t hinder creativity – it is the creativity. Ideas bleed into each other, and making happens in the middle of everything else.

"This is art made between night shifts, during breakdowns, over unpaid rent, and in half-dreamt visions. I don't wait for peace and quiet. I carry the noise with pride".

IT’S NOT A PARTY IF YOU CAN’T SEE ANYTHING

"Well, I don't show up for lukewarm champagne in curled up paper cups, to see the so-called unique painting exhibited - that painting you can’t even see because someone’s blocking it with their poke-an-eye out extended selfie-sticks.

In everything I do, my aim is to build something else – a space where small and sometimes weird ideas can grow freely, before anyone tries to smooth them out.

It’s about creating the connection between you and me. The conversation. That conversation that bridges people and expressions, art and everyday life.

It’s not about understanding everything – it’s about feeling something stir".