Messi is arguably the greatest footballer among the current players. He is recognized not only by his signature goals, but also by his tattoos. And there are more than meets the eye.
Until 2010, the Argentine did not have a single drawing on his body. Messi was known to consult Dani Alves about tattoos, asking him how much it hurt to get one. Ten years ago, the striker decided to hit the first one and since then regularly puts something new on his body. And absolutely all tattoos Messi did one master - Roberto Lopez.
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Messi and Lopez are friends. The footballer even gave Lopez a tattoo with the number 10 (Messi's game number) and invited the master to his wedding.
The wedding of Messi and Antonella Rocuzzo. How it was
And Lopez put up an ad in his salon saying, "If you don't want it to hurt when getting a tattoo, don't talk bad about Messi."
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But let's move on to a guide to Messi's tattoos:
Portrait of his mother.
This was the Argentine's first tattoo. In 2010, he tattooed a portrait of his mother, whose name is Celia, on his back. The striker has said many times that she has played a crucial role in his career. By the way, "Championship" published a big article about Messi's parents.
Photo: from the personal archive of Lionel Messi
Genes of genius. Who "brought" Lionel Messi into this world
Tattoos on his right arm
The footballer has a picture of Jesus on his right arm. The striker himself very rarely talks about religion, but according to his words, we can conclude that he is a believer. This is the largest drawing on the Argentine's body.
Here, on the right arm of the soccer player, there is another image that has to do with religion. On the elbow, a stained-glass window of the Sagrada Familia cathedral is "printed". This cathedral is the symbol of Barcelona.
A little further away from the cathedral is a picture of a lotus. Famous fact about the flower: it can appear even in swampy water. The meaning of the flower is purity and rebirth.
A continuation of the theme begun is the map of Rosario. The drawing is made so that it shows the intersecting boulevards and avenues. At the top of the map is a rosary.
Near the wrist there are gears and an antique clock. This drawing means that it is necessary to live in the present. The gears suggest that time cannot be turned back.
In addition, on the right hand of the Argentine striker, there is a crown, which symbolizes the love for his wife Antonella. On the hand of his wife has a similar picture.
The couple has another paired tattoo - Roman numerals on their fingers. It depicts the date of their wedding. The picture itself they scored immediately after the marriage.
Just above the crown is a picture of the wife's eye. Lionel met Antonella when he was five years old, so his tattoos have many references to his beloved spouse.
Birth Dates.
Four dates can be seen on the left leg over his son's arm: 24-06-87 - Messi's birthday 26-02-88 - birthday of Antonella (Messi's wife) 02-11-12 - birthday of Thiago (first son) 11-09-15 - birthday of Mateo (second son)
Photo: AMA/Getty Images
On Messi's right leg there are the same dates, but with names. Also with the date of birth of his third son Ciro.
Tattoos on his left leg
On the left calf of the Argentine striker are the hands of his firstborn son named Thiago. The son was born in 2012. Below the arms is his son's name inscribed in a heart. The tattoo means a great love for his son. Thiago, as well as his father, is engaged in soccer and plays in the children's team of Barcelona.
On the top of Thiago's arm there are 4 dates, which are the birthdays of the soccer player himself, his wife and two sons. It should be noted that on the opposite leg there are similar dates only with the names, and also the date of the birth of his third son named Ciro.
There are also drawings such as wings, a rose and a dagger on the soccer player's left foot. They are painted on his shin, on the opposite side from his son's hands. These are the 3 most used images in tattoo art, which is why Lionel was repeatedly "trolled" for these drawings on social media.
In 2021, Lionel decided to dramatically change his left leg and painted over these images with a dark color. Now this part of the leg resembles a gaiter. The footballer himself explained this deed by the fact that he does not want to show his son drawings symbolizing violence. In the end, it all turned into an image of a soccer ball with the number 10, under which he performs in games for Barcelona.
Lips
In 2021, Messi mentioned a new tattoo. Photographs soon appeared showing something red near his thigh. And after Messi scored three goals against Espanyol, he exposed his torso so much that the tattoo became visible completely. It turned out to be his wife's lips.
Photo: instagram.com/barca__catalan
The "Championship" also published an article, which collected the most unusual tattoos of athletes:
A tattoo with meaning. Why do athletes turn their bodies into a gallery?
One man did all Messi's tattoos
Leo has been working with Argentine tattoo artist Roberto Lopez for eight years now - he is the man who created every Messi tattoo. According to Roberto, he draws the sketches and applies the tattoos and Lionel himself comes up with the plots for the drawings.
Messi and Lopez have long been friends, not just master and client. Leo invited the tattooist to his wedding in June 2017, and Roberto posted a warning sign in his salon for Leo's haters: "If you do not want your tattoo to be painful, do not speak ill of Messi.
In 2014, as a token of friendship, Roberto asked Leo to give him a tattoo. Messi did not refuse and tattooed a clumsy ten on the wrist of the tattoo master.
Messi regularly posts fresh tattoos on Instagram and tags Lopez - not surprisingly, the tattoo artist quickly promoted himself. He is now Argentina's most popular tattoo artist, with 16,500 followers on his Facebook work page. For the past few years, Enzo Perez, Juan Iturbe, Angel Di Maria and other South American players came to him for fresh tattoos. For Zenit's St. Petersburg Argentines, Lopez even flew to St. Petersburg in the winter of 2017.
"I saw him just at Messi's pictures. We started working with him in Argentina," Driussi told the Zenit club magazine in November 2017. - And now the guys from the team also turn to him. We don't fly to Argentina, we invited him to St. Petersburg."
The only soccer tattoo: a ball and a ten
At the end of 2014, Messi added new tattoos on the shin of his left leg. There was a whole composition associated with soccer: a ball, a sword and the number ten.
Now there are no images of the sword. In November 2016 Messi came to the national team for friendly matches, and at the first training session journalists noticed that Leo fractured his shin. It is a blackwork tattoo, which involves painting large areas of skin black.
Messi did not explain the decision, but many Spanish media speculated that it was about Thiago, Messi did not want his son to see violent tattoos on his body.
Image of Jesus Christ on his left shoulder
The religious tattoo is performed in color, on the left shoulder of Lionel Messi is a portrait of Jesus Christ wearing a crown of thorns and staring upwards.
In conclusion, we would like to say that on the example of a successful footballer Lionel Messi, you can trace how the quality of execution of tattoos or the skill level of the master was growing. Suffice it to compare the latest work (the image of Jesus Christ, the composition with a lotus) with previous, conclusions you draw ...
Tattoo on the arm
We're almost done with the most important tattoos of the main wizard of the ball game. However, at the end of the material, the most savory cherry on the cake awaits you.
In the meantime, let's study the tattoos on Leo Messi's hands. And if the footballer chose the left leg, then with the hand the exact opposite is true. The needle touched only the right hand.
The forearm depicts the Sagrada Familia Cathedral, which is rightly considered the heart of Catalonia, the place where Leo built his career. On the inside of the forearm there is a pink flower, the symbol of Messi's talent. The sleeve is completed by an image of a clock, signifying infinity.
Paired tattoos with his wife: wedding date, crown
In 2017, Leo married his childhood friend Antonella and realized he needed new tattoos.
Remember that Roberto attended Leo's wedding? It's not just a show of friendship: right after the ceremony, Lopez had the wedding date (30.06.2017) printed on the newlyweds' ring fingers in Roman numerals.
The next tattoo appeared a couple of weeks later: on Leo's right shoulder they noticed a small crown, very similar to the tiara of the Pope (symbolically, it is located next to Jesus). The female equivalent of this crown, slightly smaller, was found on Antonella's right shoulder.
There is a very similar crown on Neymar's ring finger - he has it on it in honor of his lover Marchesini. It seems that Leo was not only inspired by Dani Alves' tattoos.
A picture of his mother on his back
Each of Messi's tattoos has a specific meaning. Leo, as usual, says nothing, but Lopez often explains the subjects of his main client's tattoos in interviews.
Messi was insanely intimidated by the needle of the tattoo machine, so he first sent his future wife Antonella to Lopez. And only after making sure the process wasn't as painful, Leo got his first tattoo in 2010. He dedicated it to the most important person in his life - his mother Celia. Messi tattooed her portrait on his left shoulder blade.
Everyone knows that 13-year-old Lionel moved from Argentina to Spain to get the growth hormone from Barça. His father went with him, but his family stayed in Rosario, and every day Messi longed for his mother.
Now Celia lives in Argentina, watches every Barça match and worries about her son like no one else. "No one wants to watch games with mom," admits Maria Messi, Leo's sister. - She screams and cries and gets wildly nervous in front of the TV.
Whenever Celia visits Barcelona, she goes to the market and buys everything she needs for schnitzel Neapolitan style (a method of cooking meat with tomatoes, basil and olive oil; Celia learned it from her Italian mother). It's Leo's favorite dish. "Thanks to my Neapolitan schnitzel, he scores so many goals," says the mother of the best scorer in Barcelona history.
The meaning of Lionel Messi's tattoo
There are 5 main tattoos on Lionel Messi's body:
- Messi's tattoo on his leg originally represented the name of his son Thiago and the image of his hands. Later, a heart with wings appeared around the name as a sign of his father's boundless love;
- Leo Messi's foot tattoo also touches on his soccer career. On his shin you can see Messi's game number - 10, a soccer ball and a rose with a sword. The overall meaning of the composition can be interpreted as an attempt to intimidate opponents on the soccer field. This tattoo was later almost completely painted over by Messi with black pigment. The resulting tattoo is in the style of blackwork, where you can see only the playing foot ball and children's hands on the calf;
- The tattoo on Messi's back is a portrait of his grandmother Celia, who brought him into soccer. It was this tattoo that became the first on the athlete's body. Lionel dedicates each of his goals to the memory of his grandmother;
- Messi tattoo on his arm consists of several images. A blue-eyed Jesus in a crown of thorns is placed on his shoulder. It is a sign of belonging to the Christian religion and deep faith. On the forearm you can consider a composition of different elements. Around the elbow is an architectural masterpiece - the dome of the Sagrada Familia Temple. The clock is a symbol of time, which cannot be stopped, and the pink lotus on the inside of the arm is a symbol of divine election, tranquility and inner harmony. All these images merge to form Messi's tattoo arm.
Most of the footballer's tattoos are done in monochrome. Color appears only in tattoos depicting Jesus and flowers.
All of Lionel Messi's tattoos are done by tattoo artist Roberto Lopez. According to the specialist, Lionel himself chooses the options of images and describes them in detail to his tattooist, after which the latter develops an individual sketch.
And recently the tattoo of Leo Messi added another image - a bright red mark from a kiss on the lower abdomen of the Argentine. He dedicated this tattoo to his beloved wife Antonella.
But for fans, Messi's tattoo can also be in another version. Fans of the talented soccer player often make tattoos with his portrait or one of the game moments with Leo. Such drawings are a sign of admiration for the skill of the athlete and an expression of respect for him.
Anyone can get a tattoo of Messi or duplicate one of Lionel's tattoos. Most often, if they copy the image of a soccer player, they retain their original location.
But tattoos with a portrait look good on the shoulders, back and chest.
Before doing tattoo Messi in any of the options is to think - will not pass infatuation for this footballer in a few years? And in the case of copying his tattoos - try to add personal details that will make the image original and give personality. Otherwise, after a while you may need to have the tattoo removed.
On the abdomen
The tour of Lionel Messi's tattoos and descriptions of their meanings ends with a small, but valuable image for the soccer player. It is located in the left lower part of the abdomen. The sketch in the form of a red imprint of a woman's lips is also dedicated to the athlete's wife. The lips belong to Antonella and once again emphasize Leo's devotion to his wife.
Each tattoo of the athlete has a serious semantic background. Therefore, even the most ardent fans of the soccer player rarely want to put identical images on their bodies. However, this does not prevent them from being inspired by the ideas of the legendary athlete and adapting their meaning for their own sketches.
