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INK MAGAZINE Graphic Design: Josephine Lee lee.josephine1@gmail.com All photos and info provided by Tattoo Artists: Adam Guy Hays Anka Lavriv Bailey Robinson Chris Kast George Bardadim John Reardon June Jung Landon Morgan Liam Sparkes Mario Cardona Mikhail Andersson Thomas Leyh
VOL 1. 1-12 BRKLYN/NYC ISSUE © Copyright 2015 JOSEPHINE LEE CONTACT EMAIL LEE.JOSEPHINE1@GMAIL.COM PRINTED IN U.S.A. by Blurb
INK MAGAZINE
Hello Reader!
Welcome to INK Magazine, your first inkers printed database. This magazine is one of a volume of four which features the tattoo artists of the Brooklyn and New York City region. Each issue covers a number of tattoo artists with designed spreads of their work, along with a personal description of themselves. The spreads consist of 10 photos of their work that shows how diverse, elaborate and personal this form of underlooked art is. The issue is dedicated to show that there is more behind the stereotypes and stencils of talented tattoo artists. It gives the opportunity for people to connect personally through the artwork that helps form a stepping stone towards expressing the idenitity of a person through their tattoos.
Happy Inking,
Josephine Lee
TABLE OF CONTENTS
01
Opening Letter
GEORGE BARDADIM
LIAM SPARKES
JUNE JUNG
04-21
22-35
36-49
50-69
70-81
82-93
JOHN REARDON
CHRIS KAST
MARIO CARDONA
ANKA LAVRIV
ADAM GUY HAYS
BAILEY ROBINSON
94-105
106-119
120-131
132-143
144-157
158-169
THOMAS LEYH
MIKHAIL ANDERSSON
LANDON MORGAN
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CONTACTS
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GEORGE BARDADIM
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“The shortage of information about tattooing available in Russia that time I compensated by experience in tattoo machine building and endless practice/experiments in tattooing.� -George Bardadim
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ussian born, George Bardadim currently lives in
RNYC. He started his carrier as a tattoo artist in
1988. The shortage of information about tattooing available in Russia that time he compensated by experience in tattoo machine building and endless practice/experiments in tattooing.
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In 1998 working for a tattoo street shop in St. Petersburg, George Bardadim started drawing tattoo flash designs and collecting them to create tattoo flash sets. In different times he used different media, from regular ball-pen, to markers and water based colors. In the late ‘90s he started traveling and worked as a guest artist for tattoo shops in different countries around Europe.
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Since then he has been invited and regularly taking part in the biggest and most important European tattoo conventions. He prefers custom work and appreciate the possibility to create designs from scratch. In his opinion, involving a customers’ in detailed discussion of requested tattoo designs is one of the most important tattooing aspects, which provides the clients’ possibility to enjoy their tattoos for the rest of their life.
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LIAM SPARKES
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iam Sparkes has previously been drumming in
LTrencher/Queen of Swords/Drum Eyes.Â
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aim is the line between “ Myabsurdity and brutality;
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in all aspects of life - artistic and otherwise .
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JUNE JUNG
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une Jung came from Busan, South Korea with a passion for drawing and painting. Upon her arrival she decided she wanted to push her skills even further to apply them to the “living canvas,� and began to pursue the art of tattoo.
J
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Once she put her mind to it, she made sure it happened with her natural talent with likelike, intricate black and gray pieces and vibrant, jeweltoned color compositions and shows an energetic style that’s still growing. She bounced around a bunch of New York shops and currently be found at Kulture which she likes because of the busy East Village atmosphere.
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June is drawn to realism because of the challenge of making a drawing go from 2D to 3D. She’s also drawn to bright color work ranging from realism to Japanese style. An avid painter, she’d like to meld the creative worlds of her painting and her tattooing.
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JOHN REARDON
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“I got into tattooing because I wanted to.
“
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ohn Reardon started in tattooing 1996. He went to Pratt
J
Institute in Brooklyn and did some tattoos in dorms
Pantas Hall and Willoughby. His first shop job was at Medusa Tattoo on St. Marks during the summer of ‘98.
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John worked all around the city. (True Blue, Daredevil/Fun City, Rising Dragon, John Paras’s Medusa Tattoo (a later medusa after the first one closed). He started tattooing at Saved Tattoo in 2006 and opened a private studio in 2010. In July 2011 he opened Greenpoint Tattoo Co.
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CHRIS
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C
hris Kast started tattooing in 2012 after apprenticing under Tito Velez at Euphoria Ink in Roselle, New Jersey. He studied different tattoo styles throughout my apprenticeship but was drawn more toward traditional American tattooing.
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“ I try to make my tattoos as such
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“
h: simple, bold and easy to read.
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Typically, Chris Kast draws reference from older tattoo flash to give the designs a cleaner, more modern look. Painting tattoo flash has played a huge part in helping him learn how to properly draw and tattoo these traditional designs.
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CARDONA
MARIO
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F
ascinated by comic books as a youth Mario Cardona took to drawing as far back as he can remember. Whatever artistic abilities he developed in his early teens he dedicated to graffiti, which helped him enhance his art from a new spectrum. Graffiti helped him get known for what he was good at.
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Some people in Mario Cardona’s neighborhood would pay him a few dollars to draw up an idea for them to take to a parlor to get tattooed. After a while they all just started asking him to get into tattooing. He didn’t think it was for him because his comfort zone was a pencil and paper. Then he started to see work by big names like Nikko Hurtado, Joshua Carlton, Carlos Torres.. to name a few. Their work blew his mind, he didn’t think that kind of art could be done on skin.So by popular demand (in Gravesend, Brooklyn) he started to learn.
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Eight years later Mario Cardona is entirely happy with his career choice. When working on his clients he learns that he can connect with them in a way he wouldn’t be able to by other relations. Most of all, he has been able to take this with him wherever he goes. That, he is most grateful for.
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Anka
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Lavriv
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nka Lavriv is a Brooklyn-based artist born in Ukraine. Originally trained as a tattoo artist in Kiev, she now works at Gristle Tattoo in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn.Â
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She is a self-taught visual artist with a unique illustrative style focusing on feminine figures drawn mostly in grayscale.Â
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ADAM GUY HAYS
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dam Guy Hays grew up in the tiny west Texas town of Alpine. The small town of about 5000 people didn’t boast more than a pretty countryside and lots of quiet. He grew up drawing and painting as a form of entertainment and a lot of his early influences are still prevalent. He still loves imagery of the American West and cowboy culture.Â
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He has lived and worked in NYC for the last 10 years now, where he is based out of Red Rocket Tattoo in midtown Manhattan. “It’s a good group of guys there and feels like home.”
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He travels frequently  to a lot of different tattoo conventions around the globe. He enjoys seeing what different cultures have to offer and the inspirations he can gather there.Â
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Ba i
le
y
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ro bin
so n
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ailey Robinson grew up in rural Alabama on a pecan orchard. He has tattooed for 11 or 12 years. He has worked at a few shops in the city and now he works privately and travels.
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THOMAS LEYH
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riginally from Buffalo NY, Chris Kast has been tattooing professionally in NYC for just over a year.
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“I specialize in the the preservation of traditional tattooing, but versatile in modern styles as well. I very much enjoy Tibetan and Japanese imagery, and am happy to tattoo it. “
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Thomas Leyh was always interested in skateboarding and punk rock growing up so it only made an easier segue to begin drawing record layouts and board graphics. By the time he was in his late teens he was getting tattooed a lot by the Mirro family in Buffalo. Those guys truly opened the door to the world of tattooing that he was interested in. They made sure he was fully covered in tattoos and had been painting flash for a few years before he even had machines. “I feel very lucky to have had that opportunity to hang around those guys, because without them I most certainly would be in jail.�
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MIKHAIL ANDERSSON
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“ I realized that it (tattooing) can bring me freedom to create what I want, be independent and free and travel around the world, working in different places.
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riginally Mikhail Andersson is from Moscow, Russia, but currently lives in New York. His working hours are 11am to 7pm. He works every day except Tuesdays and Thursdays, on Sundays shop is closed. Mikhail prefers doing color realism and black and grey realism and wants to do more of those, it’s his preference. He also loves doing watercolor and trash-polka tattoos. If someone has big projects that they want to do, like sleeves, back-piece tattoos he can give them a good deal for it. He also makes a thing on his Facebook page every month, and the first person who will reply to his post will get a free tattoo from him. He uses only vegan, non toxic ink that he has never seen any skin allergies from. And also if anyone have questions about aftercare they can check that page on his website. He has been tattooing since 2008 and he was always trying to get a lot of new ideas and different experience from artists he was working with.
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Mikhail Anderson graduated school in Russia as a computer designer and advertising manager. He didn’t like working at that sphere at all. “Its like, when someone makes a time frame for you to create a logo for a company or a banner or to draw a full design of a website, and they will pay you $15-30 for that, there is no creativity and inspiration in that, only stress and other negative things.�
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Then he tried to do his own business, “but without good friends in a government it was tough to survive in a big waterfall of corrupted country�, so he closed it in 2 years. He was always thinking about something more that he would be happy doing every day and what could become his passion. So his thoughts came to the tattoo industry. He was painting at school and went to art classes for the first 2 years at college but then focused more on computer art and design. It helps him a lot in his tattooing now and he is very thankful. He has started tattooing less and doing more art, because he wants to focus more on the projects interesting for him, to have more time for painting.
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LANDON
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MORGAN
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lbert Camus and Cari Coleman are ultimately why Landon Morgan chose this career path. He was writing a paper on futile labor and realized how pointlessly he was going about living. Art had always been a big release for him in many different forms. However, he couldn’t focus on one outlet until he realized he never wanted to work futilely another day in his life. So he called his best friend and tattoo artist, Cari Coleman, and asked if she would take him on as her apprentice.
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contacts
George Bardadim bardadim.tattoo bardadim@gmail.com @bardadim
Liam Sparkes liamsparkes.bigcartel.com liamsparkesok@gmail.com IG: @liamsparkesok
John Reardon johnreardontattoos.com johnreardontattoos @gmail.com @johnreardontattoos
Chris Kast chrisekast@gmail.com @chriskast
June Jung tat toojune.com junejung99@gmail.com @tat toojune
Mario Cardona inksworthtattoos.com inksworth@gmail.com @inksworth
Anka Lavriv ankalavriv.squarespace.com ankalavriv@gmail.com @ankalavrivtattoo
Adam Guy Hays adamguyhays.com info@adamguyhays.com @adamguyhays
Bailey Robinson baileyhunterrobinson.com info@baileyhunterrobinson.com @baileyhrobinson
Thomas Leyh redrockettattoo.com/artist/ thomas-leyh/ thomasleyhtattoos@gmail.com @thomasleyh
Mikhail Andersson tattookarma.com micleandersson@gmail.com @micleandersson FB: anderssonmicle
Landon Morgan tattoosbylandon@gmail.com @tattoosbylandon