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Barbara Nicole ✨

@barbara_k117

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Journalism & Poetry | PSU Alum | @simple.spoon.photos 📸

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5 years of TTMD🖤🎟️✨

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A poser goes to a Halsey show…

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Nothing’s New

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Autumnal Adventures 🍂

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back to badlands 💖✨🦋

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Assorted photographs and collages (physical and digital)

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Barbara Kutz is a 23-year-old from Gloucester City, New Jersey, working as a counter attendant at Ikonic Tattoo in State College.

She had her first tattoo when she was 18. Now, she has 51 tattoos. She estimates she has spent around $7,000 on them.

“I’ve always been a tattoo fan. I was a really big pop-punk girl when I was 14, so all those bands had tons of tattoos,” she said.

In 2019, Barbara walked into Ikonic Tattoo as a customer when she was a Penn State student double majoring in English and journalism. After graduating, she put her degree to use. She got her master’s in English and was teaching English 15 at Penn State, but something was missing.

“It was kind of disheartening because I always wanted to teach, but this is not fun,” she said. “I wanted something that I can actually enjoy coming in to do and working here is just that.”

A lot of the excitement that Barbara feels comes from students who are getting their first tattoos. But she does have some advice for them.

“Just make sure that this is something you want forever. College feels like a really infinite time for a lot of people, but it’s four years,” she said.

Barbara wants to go back to school and get a Master of Fine Arts in creative writing. While this could be a commitment that could take her away from the tattoo industry, she knows doors will be open to come back.

“I was a first-generation college student, so it would be kind of sick to say I got the equivalent of a doctorate in my field,” she said.

Barbara has a message to the world:“Just be nice to people. Be nice and nice things come to you.”

Photos and story by Jake Hernick
#statecollege #weare #photography #happyvalley #community #tattoos #centrecounty #pennstate

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Dear Mario: Please come to the castle. I’ve baked a cake for you. Yours truly - Princess Toadstool

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Just some old photos I never got around to posting :)

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thank you, penn state, for two degrees and these amazing people 💙🤍

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There’s no time to question my moves

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self image, wife, people i dont know

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