A museum in a former Masonic temple doesn’t seem like the typical setting for a live tattoo artist — but that’s exactly who the National Museum of Women in the Arts (NMWA) invited to help kick off their grand reopening in October.

It was one of the more outside-the-box ideas the museum staff came up with for the event, which brought visitors back inside the downtown D.C. building for the first time in two years: a flash tattoo station inspired by the museum’s signature collection. And they found the perfect artist for the job in Takoma Park tattoo artist Bibi Abelle.

Since she started taking clients in 2020, Abelle has quickly amassed a devoted following among customers seeking out fine-line tattoos and recreations of famous artwork. She currently books appointments two to three months out, depending on the time of year, making her one of the preeminent tattoo artists in the D.C. area. (Her calendar will reopen for appointments in February and March on Jan. 11.)

Born Britteny Etienne (“Bibi” was a childhood nickname from her parents, and she took “Abelle’ as a professional surname because it stems from the French word for “beautiful”), Abelle has always been drawn to art and the creative side of her brain. She attributes this to her father, whose “calligraphy-like” handwriting is the most beautiful she’s ever seen, she says. But Abelle really honed her skills through experimentation and, as a teen, gravitated toward the intimacy of thin-line pencils and paintbrushes.

However, any semblance of a “normal” adolescence was halted after a shocking cancer diagnosis.

In 2013, at just 15, Abelle was diagnosed with Ewing sarcoma, a cancer of the bone or soft tissues. After completing over a year of intense chemotherapy, she was in remission. But about a year later, the cancer returned in the same area, and Abelle underwent surgery, radiation therapy, and another round of chemotherapy. Today, at 26, Abelle has been cancer free for over eight years.

The harrowing experience gave her a renewed sense of what she wanted out of life. She dropped out of an unfulfilling college experience and quit her property management job in D.C. She now views those decisions not as setbacks but as milestones that brought her closer to her purpose.

“Because I went through a super traumatic time, I knew that I had to do what I want and what I’m good at,” Abelle says. “And I was always really good at drawing, painting, or makeup, or whatever involved moving my hand.”

Abelle first tried her hand at makeup, doing makeup for clients with hopes of starting a cosmetics line down the road. Around this time, she asked her friend who owned a tattoo needle if she could give it a try. It was an instant match.

“When I did my first tattoo, a flower, it felt so fucking natural it was almost unreal,” she tells DCist/WAMU. “And the tattoo looked good.”

Shortly after, Abelle pivoted to tattooing full-time. Many tattoo artists begin as unpaid apprentices in established shops, doing tasks ranging from taking out the trash to taking walk-in customers. Apprenticeships can last up to four years. But Abelle bypassed that path by continuing to teach herself and diving head-first into making a business out of her newfound passion.

Abelle’s parents allowed her to use the spare room in their basement as her private studio, which helped establish her brand but wasn’t the most suitable location for the artist or her customers.

“It was a little uncomfortable having strangers coming into my space, but I can’t imagine how uncomfortable it may have been for strangers to come to somebody’s house,” Abelle admits.

Awkwardness aside, Abelle was grateful for her parents’ support, which allowed her business to grow in a short amount of time: Early in 2022, she moved out of the spare room into a private studio nearby in Takoma Park’s Main Street business district. There, she puts customers at ease by playing relaxing music from artists like Stevie Wonder and Tommy Newport, and exhibiting the bedside manner of a trained medical professional.

She has hosted flash events in different places around the D.C. area. She has also been invited to do guest spots by tattoo shops in other cities — New York, Los Angeles, and Miami — including at Atelier Eva, a Brooklyn-based shop owned by one of Abelle’s idols and one of the originators of the fine line style, Eva Karabudak. (Abelle has more than 20 tattoos herself, mostly from shops in New York, ranging from her zip code, “20912,” to images of her favorite sneakers and her dog’s favorite toy.)

“Bibi’s fine-line portfolio of works, concise aesthetic with her [Instagram] profile, and strong work ethic overall stood out to me,” Doug Harris, Atelier Eva’s studio manager, says about Abelle.

While fine-line tattoos have become something of a trend, Abelle has set herself apart by recreating famous artwork, including The Creation of Adam by Michaelangelo, The Lovers II by Rene Magritte, Isadora Duncan by Arthur Genthe, and many more. Much of her work comes from a deep interest in art history and her love of realism, so when she was approached by a staff member of the National Museum of Women in the Arts to collaborate, it was a no-brainer, she says.

The collaboration originated from a word-of-mouth suggestion. Adriana Regalado, the museum’s director of retail operations caught wind of Abelle via Washingtonian Problems’ Instagram page. Regalado set up a tattoo appointment with Abelle in March, during which she floated the idea of a collaboration between the artist and NMWA. The museum first featured Abelle in their Shop Talk series, a forum to highlight women artists. Abelle also gave NWMA Senior Membership Manager Gabby Awuma a tattoo inspired by the museum’s Fede Galizia artwork Cherries in a Silver Compote for the NMWA TikTok channel.

“Based on the success of the social post/e-news, we all thought it would be a great idea to invite Bibi to give visitors a permanent memorial of their visit,” Awuma told DCist/WAMU in an email. “We sent her a list of artworks that could serve as inspiration and invited her for a walk-through of the galleries so she could see some of them in person.”

Abelle’s schedule for the day was booked within the first two hours of the museum’s opening event. She tattooed between 15 and 20 people, and her station ended up being one of NMWA’s Director Susan Fisher Sterling’s favorite activities of the day, according to a NWMA blog post covering the reopening.

While she’s come a long way since she first picked up a needle three years ago, Abelle still sees areas where she can grow. She dreams of a day when she can hire an assistant to take on the administrative parts of the job and move to an even bigger studio, where she could host art showcases and events. She also hopes to collaborate on more events — the NMWA hinted at the possibility of another flash event with Abelle in 2024, though no plans have been confirmed. For now, she is simply overwhelmed by the outpouring of support for her art.

“Every time I open my books for appointments, I’m so grateful for the hundreds of requests I get from potential clients,” Abelle says. “When I started, I didn’t imagine this would happen so quickly.”