Tag: artist

Posted on

Interview with Tattooist Joe Ankave

26-year-old Joe Ankave is a tattoo artist from Te Aviv, Israel who is currently traveling in California. We caught up with Joe to chat about his tattooing style and the tattoo scene in Israel…

4k7a9922-print

How long have you been tattooing and how did you get into the industry? I’ve tattooing for almost seven years now. When I was 16 years old I knew that I wanted to develop my drawing skills and take them to the next step. After a couple of years I bought my first machine and started working privately at home and I work by myself till this day – I don’t have a master. In Israel you don’t need a license to do this, and it is quite different from the UK.

IMG_4339

What inspired you to become a tattooer? Was there a particular person? From day one, Shige inspired me the most, and he still inspires me today actually. Shige is the one who took traditional Irezumi to the next level, he turned it into the modern form of neo-traditional tattooing.

How would you describe your tattooing style? My main style is neo-Japanese. Some would say that I do bold colour work, which is kinda funny. All tattoos must be done as bold as possible, so that they look right. In time tattoos fade more and more, so why not make it bold from the beginning?

IMG_4345
What do you like to tattoo? Is there anything you would love to tattoo? The object that I like to tattoo the most is the peony flower. This kind of flower has great potential, especially when it comes to different sizes. You can create a beautiful movement within the tattoo and of course to do a nice bit of colour work.

What was your first tattoo? I’m not sure about that, but I think the first tattoo I did was a smile on my friend’s leg.

IMG_3112
What’s the tattoo scene like in Israel? It’s getting better and better! People are getting more and more tattoos and also big ones! There are many new tattooers and new tattoo shops, especially in Tel-Aviv. Also every year there’s the Israel Tattoo Convention and every year more and more people are coming over. Now you can clearly see a huge difference in the amount of people that are exposed to tattooing.

IMG_6020
What kind of reactions do your tattoos get? It’s funny to say that but people love my tattoos even those who don’t have tattoos or say that they don’t like Japanese work at all. I believe that when I try to do my best with each new tattoo, when I harness the ability to focus on the small details, I can create a sort of magic. When people look at my tattoos they can see it too, it’s hard to explain but just the way I see it.

Posted on

Interview with Kelly Julio

Tattooer Kelly Julio works out of Pulse Tattoo in Banbury, UK. We caught up with Kelly to chat about his tattoo style and how his career is more than just a job to him…

How long have you been tattooing? What inspired you to get into the industry? I started getting serious about tattooing around the end of 2004, after learning a lot from working at a friend’s tattoo studio in Jakarta, Indonesia.
I had and still have a strong passion for drawing, painting and graphic design and knew I wanted to make art part of my career.


What did you do before? Did you study art? I worked in hospitality for a couple of years, but deep down I knew it wasn’t for me and what I was meant to be doing. Although I have never studied art formally, I learned a lot from friends, art books, architectural art, photography as well as from traditional and cultural arts from several countries, especially my own, Indonesia, an infinite resource of inspiration for me.


What do you like most about your work? Tattooing is so much more than just work, more than just a way to make a living. I feel extremely happy when I can translate my customer’s idea or concept into something that they are happy to get inked on their body, which will accompany them throughout their life. I also love the human side of tattooing, being able to talk about everything and anything with my customers, not only about tattooing; sharing thoughts, ideas and learning from them.

How would you describe the style of your work? I am probably best described as an all-rounder, because so many things inspire my work. I want to please my customers by translating their ideas into a tattoo without restricting them.

4

What is your favorite style of work and your favorite subject to work on? What inspires you? I love color as well as black and grey, I really enjoy working on mandala, geometric and pointillism pieces. I am really inspired by Art Nouveau, traditional ornaments and patterns.

Do you have any planned conventions or guest spots? I am taking part in the Oxford Tattoo Convention on 1st and 2nd of September this year. Next year, I am planning to participate in several tattoo conventions in Europe and the UK.

3

Be sure to follow Kelly Julio on Facebook to see more of his tattoos and artwork.

Posted on

Interview with Santa Perpetua

Tattoo artist Santa Perpetua creates impressively abstract tattoos in her private studio in Brighton. We chat to Santa about how her tattoos tell stories and how her career started…

20180215_153417

How long have you been tattooing and how did you start? I think art has been part of my life since I was born. My mother is an artist too, and she basically introduced me into this world. I grew up with art books, pencils and brushes around, art museums were my playground and drawing was my first way to connect with myself. But my interest in the tattoo industry started a while after that. It began when I got my first tattoo piece done in my home town: Montevideo. By that time I was 21, but I didn’t immerse myself in that world until 10 years later.  A bad economic situation at that moment, my university studies, my current job as a designer and photographer, my passion for drawing, moving to Spain and some other personal circumstances made the task of starting to tattoo a bit difficult.

So although I really was into the idea of becoming a tattoo artist, I had to postpone it for a while. It became possible when I finally got settled in Barcelona and since 2008 I’ve been developing myself in the profession. Strange as it might sound, I didn’t like tattoos before. I got my first piece done in the early 90s and the level of tattooing was not as good as it is today.

B1D9E170-7E70-4D7B-814F-72485F36DF1D

But for some  reason, I felt the need to record a permanent memory on my skin, so I made a really simple, silly, too small and too detailed for its size design and I went for it! When I was sat in the tattoo chair, I had a very primitive introduction to tattooing and I completely felt in love with it! I always liked to try different media to make my drawings, and tattooing was another one of them. When finallyI was able to start, I knew immediately that tattooing would be part of my life for good. Since I started I’ve never stopped learning, creating and loving this profession.

20180218_190328

Your style is incredibly abstract, how would you describe it? Well, I don’t think we should label things in art. From my view, art allows the emotional expression of the artist to become real. My pieces could fall into abstraction, avant garde, conceptual, graphic art, contemporary tattooing. But if I had to describe them, I’d say that my artworks are just my personal approach to things. I always tell stories that are beyond a particular situation or representation. I love speaking about life, death, and emotions through my artwork. If someone comes to my studio asking to have a bird done, I always ask why they have chosen a bird. I am interested in the motivations behind the tattoo rather than the elements of it. My intention is to build a solid idea, as timeless and universal as possible rather that making just a “pretty” or “cool” image on the skin. I know it might sound a bit ambitious, but my approach to tattooing is more artistic than aesthetic.

20180223_1628561

Are you inspired by any artists? I am mad about the Dark Ages. I absolutely love that time in history. I get inspiration from the way in which art and artists were conceived – the artistic expression is divine and the artist is just a tool to represent it. But beyond that, and even admiring lots of tattoo colleagues, I mainly get my inspiration from dreaming, and also from music and painting. The list of artists on both branches is pretty long and super varied. But summing up, I’d say that everything that is well made catches my attention.

20180208_152234

Would do you like to tattoo? Do you have a wish list of designs? After 10 years of working as a tattoo artist, and almost five years doing it in the UK, I could happily say that I have reached the point in which I do exactly what I want to do. It has been a super thorny path to achieve, but today people tend to give me free reign on all my designs. Thanks to this I’ve managed to evolve technically and artistically. Every tattoo project I take is a challenge that pushes me to improve and do my best with it, and that is extremely pleasant to me. I do not have a wish list of designs, but I do have the wish to carry on being blessed with people who connect with my artwork and trust their skin in my hands. I am immensely grateful for that.

Posted on

Interview with Elle Donlon

30-year-old tattoo artist Ellena Donlon works out of Sweet Life Gallery in Birmingham and creates traditional tattoos. We caught up with Elle to chat Korean tigers, as well as what and who inspires her work…

840c19f1-3b52-40f9-96cb-b3f9ff512293

How long have you been tattooing? I started my apprenticeship September 2015. Prior to that I went to the University of the Arts in London studying a degree in Fine Art and I think I graduated in 2012. Graduating was a tough time, I never really enjoyed my degree as I felt I had to stop drawing and painting to make way for more conceptual work to please the tutors, that meant I lost a lot of direction, so I decided to figure things out and move back to my hometown, Birmingham.

IMG_2763

What inspired you to join the industry? Did you do anything related to art before? Me and my partner opened up a record shop and as I started to get tattooed again after a good 5 year gap, I realized that tattooing would be my dream job. I started to seek out an apprenticeship, which took a long time, but I persevered it was the only thing I could think of that I wanted to do with myself, and that was worth waiting for.

IMG_2248

Can you describe your style? Starting off my apprenticeship my style was very different to what it is now. Then it was purely a case of turning my style of illustrations into tattoos. I’ve only ever really had traditional tattoos on myself, and as my career has progressed my designs have evolved into a stylised version of western traditional.

IMG_2190

We love your Korean style tigers and animals, what inspires these? What influences your work? What inspires you? Korean style tigers! They’re so freaky I love them, I have a huge one on my back done by Will Geary who has a crazy good imagination, it’s actually bonkers. I guess I’m drawn to beautiful oddities. I see no point drawing things how they are in real life, the world can be very monochrome it’s up to artists to mix that up, so I guess that’s why I’m drawn to them.

IMG_1837

Also you create more traditional women and flora is this inspired by something completely different? I get inspired by a lot of religious imagery particularly from Asia, I love south western tribal art, alchemy and witchcraft and the 70’s! But I must say my biggest push are other tattoos artists. Some of my inspirations are Walter McDonald, Dan Higgs, Robert Ryan, Windle Berry and Gregory Whitehead. All of these people adopt this weirdo traditional style, which is what I hope to one day pursue. I love that surreal style it pushes me to work harder with my own and attempt to think in different ways.

But my true loves are Claudia de Sabe, Rachel Rhatklor, Valerie Vargas, Wendy Pham and Lizzie Renaud. Apart from Wendy Pham these women predominantly tattoo traditional ladies and lady heads. Ladies and flora have always been my favorite subject to draw even before I tattooed, I can draw and tattoo them forever no inspiration even needed, it just cheers me up. I don’t really see my lady heads as a separate thing per se, but they certainly come a bit more naturally to me than my animal or surreal work.

IMG_1104

Is there anything you would love to tattoo? I’m desperate to do more famous lady heads. I Would love to do anything from a John Waters’ film, Dolly Parton, Cher, Poison Ivy from the Cramps, the girls from B-52s, Kim Gordon if any of those trigger anyone’s fancy!

IMG_8368

Can you tell us about your own tattoo collection. My personal collection is predominately traditional. The thing I love so much about a traditional tattoo is that is gets better with time, like fancy cheese! In my opinion this is the style (alongside Japanese traditional and tribal) that celebrates the body so perfectly, it is timeless yet has still evolved with each decade. I love Dan Higgs, I have tributes from both Nick Baldwin and Teide who are both fans of his work and I think they’re my favorites. Me and my partner are going to LA later this year we’re hoping to get tattoos from Derrick Snodgrass, And I’m saving my hands for Rachel Rhatklor, if I ever get chance to go over to Australia or she guests over here.

IMG_1836

Do you have any guest spots planned? I will be guesting at Crooked Claw in Sheffield in April and Death’s Door, Brighton in June, with some other exciting ones in the pipeline!

Posted on

Interview with Ruslan & Tonya

26-year-old Tonya and 29-year-old Ruslan are tattooers from Russia. The couple work together in their private studio Abusev Tattoo in Moscow. We speak to Tonya about their unique style of tattooing…

_DSC4009

When we’re not tattooing at our studio we travel around Europe, soon we’ll be working in Barcelona, then Istanbul and Berlin.

We started our tattoo collaboration over five years ago in Russia. Since then our tattooing has transformed into what we call BIOGRAFIKA. It is not a style it is more like a way to see form and composition on human body. We both tattoo in black and color ink, although I mostly enjoy playing around with my colours and Ruslan likes to stick to black.

обработано в 2018_7

We both work on the composition of a tattoo, creating its shapes and forms. Although I enjoy using colour  in my work, I do agree with Ruslan that black fits best on skin.

Inspiration is what makes our collaboration so special. We inspire each other to be better people, better artists, better tattooers! Working together is not always easy, it takes a lot of patience, and a great will to create something truly unique! We always try to bring something new into every tattoo project.

Для контакта

It is pretty hard to describe how we met and how we started tattooing together, but each of our lives had wild twists before fate brought us together. Ruslan was working as a professional tattooer when I found him, he did a cover-up for me, and it all went from there – it’s our crazy story!

инстаграмм

One which you would love to see in a movie. I truly love the place we have reached so far, it’s a happy life of two tattooers that never let eachother get bored. Tattoos brought passion into my life. And from what I see, every tattoo we create brings a new life chapter to the person wearing it.

1_11