What do I like most about my life and career as a tattoo artist? Lifelong friendships. Seriously. How cool is it that a talent for art brings together two people who begin to tattoo and find themselves 30 years later continuing that journey.
So today we look at a few projects with some of my very best tattoo buddies. My friends. My customers. My life long relationships where we enjoy art etched into human skin.
I have known Matt for almost three decades. He sported one of my first bio sleeves and we also rebuilt his other arm connecting quite a few tattoos into a singular theme. But before all that we met in the 1990’s to tattoo a fire and water reversal concept at one of my very first two tattoo studios.
We have done both chest plates and now the back as well. Can't wait to finish his version of hell at the bottom. We do have some more work on his angel chest plate too. I guess my point is, lifelong tattoo friends really do get to have some memories together. I love that.
And how about the family? Below is one of the brightest color tattoos I have ever done on Matt’s son. Now we are talking special. Not only friendship but generational passion and love for tattooing and the friendships it creates.
Carmen and me started as early as can be possible. Carmen was one of my very first tattoo clients back in 1993. I told my friends I would tattoo five people for free and after that it would be $100 per hour. Well Carmen was one of those lucky few.
And here is a very little known fact; I actually covered up my own work on this back piece. The fiery was done back in 1995 or so where I had warned that the face would be too small to last the test of time. True to my words, we decided to cover it up ten years later as part pf the finished back.
Here you can the very first designs to go down as we calculated how to do the difficult cover up.
Carmen and I have know each other since we were teenagers. She was one of my first tattoo clients and will probably be one of my last when that time comes. We have done work now down one of her arms and even onto the other arms chest. We have gone down the other side of the butt and one day I will show that new work as well.
I am blessed. Life has been very good to me provide a wealth of friendship and art colliding in lifelong stories. I will make sure and break out another couple of these long term friendships soon. Until then, reach out and let’s get creating.