The scarecrow has origins rooted in rural farm life dating back to even the Ancient Egyptians.
Symbolic and helpful, scarecrows have played a necessary role in human settling, but beyond its utilitarian function, scarecrows distinctly portray a humanoid figure that can often be taken as eerie and unsettling.
Perhaps they do more than scaring the crows and images that conjure fear and a sense of hollow creatures that will undoubtedly come to life.
Scarecrow tattoos can range from evil beings, lovable goofs, to whimsical creatures. The depictions varying based on the nature of their intent–whether the adaptation arrives from the words of L. Frank Baum, the spooky nightmares of a horror film, or the supervillains of a comic book.
Tattered clothes stuffed with straw and a terrifying pumpkin head drenched with a drooping, and dangling from a post; much of the scarecrow tattoo imagery is dark, curious, and sinister–the exact function of a scarecrow, after all the word “scare” is in the name. Inanimate and yet our mind can sometimes have difficulty accepting this reality. Is it our desire to feel less empty? Do scarecrows represent a hollowness within? Or are they just simply meant to scare the crap out of us?
Scarecrows are known to be decoys and many who obtain a tattoo of this type feel the same. The symbol, of not being who you say you are, speaks to those people.
A scarecrow embodies the experience of existing to warn others away. Wanting people to keep away is easily displayed through the imagery of a scarecrow. Tattooing one’s own face on the scarecrow is common as it represents themselves.
