Behind The Needle: The Cast of LA Ink

Posted on 04. Nov, 2008 by Administrator in Film/TV, Profiles

words by Devoe Yates, photos by Noah Schutz

For you tattoo aficionados out there, you might be a wee bit excited to learn that Kat Von D and the crew of her High Voltage tattoo studio are back for another season of LA Ink. It’s one of the few shows on TV, barring its sister show, Miami Ink, that takes us into the world of tattoo artists and their subjects and finds the creativity and emotional resonance that can sometimes be found in its realms. Though the show sometimes centers around the day-to-day banality of a trip to the beach or who’s going to babysit someone’s dog, the series has been known to delve into what it is that makes us want tattoos, what they mean to us, and how important it is to find the right artist to create your own personalized body art. That, and occasionally you’ll get some Steve-O hijinks thrown in just for fun.

We recently stopped by the shop to catch up with Kat, Corey Miller, her mentor of sorts, and Hannah Aitchison, one of the shop’s celebrated tattoo artists. Hannah, in person, is sweet and kind, and her sentences are oftenpunctuated with “gosh” and “good grief”, word pepper that one would expect of a Midwestern mom and not from a hell-raising, tattoo scrawling demon. And the reason behind this would be that Hannah is indeed the mother of a 24-year-old daughter, a daughter whom she’s actually tattooed on occasion: “I’ve done both of her tattoos. I think I would’ve been really upset if she would’ve gone to somebody else for her tattoos. That would’ve been some pretty intense disappointment there.”

One might wonder how Hannah first got into tattoos. “The first time I ever remember wanting to get a tattoo, gosh, it’s so funny. It wasn’t like I was a ten-year-old child coveting body art. When my brother was 14, he was the kid who was always craving it, he went and got this little lizard on his arm and when he came home, I was like, ‘That’s the coolest thing ever!’ So we went together to get mine. I think I was 16. And that was it, my first craving and I acted on it immediately. I saved my babysitting money and went and defied my parents.”

I curiously venture to find out what this tattoo was. “It was a big tarantula on my back. This huge black and grey, nasty, prison-style tattoo. It was done by this big biker named Sluggo out in Aurora [IL]. I came home and I was looking to get a reaction, but my mother looked at me and said, ‘Look at that! Look at the craftsmanship! It’s so realistic! He really did a great job.’ She was calling my grandmother, ‘Mom! Mom, come over and look at this!’ Not the reaction I was anticipating at all, they were not upset.”

Her brother, Guy Aitchison, soon became one of the leading voices in the tattoo community and one of its most influential artists. He soon guided Hannah into becoming a tattoo artist. “The first person I ever tattooed was one of my fellow apprentices at my very first job. This poor guy, I feel so bad for him (laughs). There is a spiral of shame associated with this tattoo. He was so great about letting me do it, he was such a good sport. Years later he came to me to get it touched up when I was working at a different shop. I’d just started working there and I didn’t know what their policy was on free work, so I charged him for the touch up and that was completely unethical. I still feel unbelievably shitty about it to this day. That’s the only time I’ve ever charged anyone for a touch up and it’s the most important tattoo I’ve ever done. It wasn’t epic work by any stretch. It was this maniacal crazed insect. When I first started drawing for tattoos, all of my little critters were like ‘UARRGG!’ crazed, zombified, Bernie Wrightson inspired creature things.”

Hannah’s artwork soon evolved into elaborate creations with vivid colors, and now, in her spare time, Hannah teaches figure drawing for tattoo work. But there’s one thing that she feels that’s nearly impossible to teach: “The hardest thing to teach is the instinctive understanding of light. Light is probably the single most important thing for creating shape and understanding color and how things interplay with each other. You can look at something that’s theoretically a fairly smooth surface and you’re still going to see gradations in color based on the light and that’s such an intangible thing to try and explain to someone.”

As for the upcoming season, Hannah promises some new surprises. “There’s a lot more story this season than in previous seasons. Corey and I form a band (laughs). We were talking about doing it two seasons ago, we both love jazz and wanted to form a little jazz combo. Upright bass, piano, drums. I sing. Then about a month and a half ago, the network was like, ‘Hey! We decided we want to do that band thing with you and Corey. Monday we’ve got you set up for voice lessons, Wednesday is rehearsal, Thursday we tape!’ It was kinda stressful but it was fun. Corey is an amazing drummer. He’s been playing drums longer than he’s been tattooing.”

With all these exciting tales to tell, it would seem that there must be a downside to life as a prominent tattoo artist. “Unfortunately,” says Hannah, “TV shows like this do nothing to dissuade people from the misconception that it’s this great glamorous rock star life and you make all this money and you party all the time; you listen to heavy metal and stay up all night and really don’t have any responsibilities. But you can’t do that and be any good at this. If you want the success, it comes with an insane level of discipline. This is a vocation, and if you’re any good at it, it eats up your entire life. That’s it, game over. So, it means that everything you read is going to fuel your work. Every time you go out, you’re looking at architectural elements everywhere and you’re like, ‘Oh yeah, I can use that in the top of that thing I’m drawing for that guy.’ You’re taking pictures all the time, constantly researching, upgrading, buying new equipment, networking with other people, traveling, working insane hours. It’s a compulsion. It really does just consume you. But fortunately, if you love what you do, it becomes, as Ray Bradbury once said, ‘a vacation vocation’. It doesn’t feel like so much of a sacrifice. This is your defining charateristic, this is who you are.”

With this, it’s time to check in with Corey who’s just finished his photo shoot. As he sinks into the Gothic armchair at the front of the shop, he still seems a little taken aback that he actually just did a photo for a TV series that he’s on. Corey is all Southern California, laid back and cool with the sun in his soul. While working on the show, Corey also runs his own tattoo shop of 12 years, Six Feet Under, in Upland, CA.

I wonder if the show’s affected him, or the tattoo world he works in for that matter. “I say this with a smile because it’s funny. I was the same person three years ago that I am now, but three years ago someone might look at me in the grocery store with their kid, and coddle their kid and keep them away from me. But now it’s like, ‘Hi! You’re on TV! Meet my children! Do you wanna babysit?’ (laughs). You know? You go from being a tattooed trippy person to, when you’re on TV, totally, fully accepted. Tattooing has been way more accepted in the last nine or ten years and I think the show’s probably working that momentum. A lot of people that would’ve never walked into a tattoo shop before are now down for it. On TV, they see this cool atmosphere that they might’ve been afraid to walk into before. Some places are still pretty dangerous, there’s always been really seedy shops. It’s really nice to remember that type of tattoo shop, but I’m so glad it’s changed. I have kids, I want my little boy and my little girls to be able walk into my shop and it’s cool.”

Corey’s kids might not have tattoos yet, but they are curious about them. “You know, they’re children, they’re so innocent. I will tell you this about how they see tattoos, and as to how the times have changed and tattoos are more accepted. This story happened at my house. These days, the kids don’t open the door to strangers, that’s just the way it is. But one day I was down the hall and my little boy opens the door for this guy and I’m like, ‘What the hell? Clay, what’re you doing?’ And he tells me, ‘Dad, it’s okay.’ He put his hands up, ‘Listen, let me explain, I looked outside and he has tattoos; he’s a good guy.’ I’m like, ‘Clay, just because someone has tattoos doesn’t mean they’re a good guy. There’s people without tattoos that are good guys, too. The point is, you don’t just open the door for strangers.’ That’s his innocence, but that’s true. That shows that it’s changed, especially in my household. For better or for worse, it is what it is.”

As for Corey’s own first dealing with tattoos, “I remember being a little boy, probably when I was six, seeing my grandfather’s tattoo. He had a big black rose on his arm. I never really thought about it much, but when I was 15, I was in a punk band and my buddies had ‘em, and I was like, ‘Oh man, once I get in the band, I’m getting mine.’ I did one on myself with a straight pin and a razor blade and that was just how it worked out for me. That’s what I wanted to do. And then I made a homemade machine out of a fish tank pump motor and a guitar string – something I would never advise to kids nowadays because it’s so dangerous. I’m not trying to keep anybody down, it just really is dangerous. But I wanted a tattoo as a kid and I got one. What’s pretty incredible is that when I was 15, I was playing drums and tattooing. And I’m 41 now and I’m playing drums and tattooing. But Ihave a mortgage and three kids and that’s the coolest thing in my life. I’m just a lucky fucker, you know?”

I asked if he thought tattooing had become oversold. “With the popularity of tattooing, along come the snake oil salesmen. These guys see the marketability of it all. Ironically I can say that and a lot of people feel like I’m selling out the business by being on this show. I don’t feel like I’m selling out this business, and anybody that thinks that I am, they can think whatever the fuck they want. I’m just going along with my ride and the circus tent is really big right now. And you know, who doesn’t want to make money? I’ve always wanted to. One of these days I probably will (laughs). I just want to have a good life and spoil my kids, and tattooing – who woulda thought? It’s just what I do.”

As the boring tattoos of barbed wire and such make their way about the world, I ask Corey if he has any pet peeves about tattoos, or looks disdainfully down at such common work. “I honestly have never been much of a hater. I even like shitty tattoos (laughs), and believe me, I can recognize them. You can read ‘em like hieroglyphs, you know? So, I like the shitty ones because they have their own history and they also make the good ones look even better. And not even joking, it’s a part of someone’s life. No, I’m way more of an observer, man. People can do what the fuck they wanna do.”

As Corey wraps it up, there is a rumbling and churning from the back parking lot as Kat Von D pulls up in her classic yellow fancy car. I won’t pretend to know the model and make as I don’t know much about cars, but I will tell you that it’s a badass antique mobile that lowers to the ground via air hydraulics once it’s placed in park. There’s a picture of it over there, so gawk.

When h last caught up with Kat Von D, it was nearly six months ago when she was forging her first movie role as Vinnie Jones’ vampire henchwoman in the yet to be released action-horror fare, The Bleeding. At the time, she said this about her first serious acting roll in a box office up and comer: “I’ve been tattooing since I was 14 and everybody’s always expected me to fail. I think this is just one more thing to prove people wrong about.” Wisely she decided to play a character close to home. “I figured for my first movie I should do something that wasn’t too out of my normal element. I’m playing a mutant vampire, and I’m kind of like that in real life, so it’s not too far from reality (laughs). But it’s a different world, the world of acting, and I’m in no way trying to mock the jobs of people that have dedicated their entire lives to it, but at the same time I don’t think it’s rocket surgery.”

Kat had also been in her trailer diligently working on a soon to be released book, which is a history of her evolution as a tattoo artist. “I finished it and now it’s getting printed, it comes out the last week of January. I’m pretty excited. I’m combining my book tour with this Tattoo Music Festival I’m throwing. I did it last year here in Orange County and now we’re making a tour out of it with 200 tattooers that are in bands. It’ll be a five week tour.”

The book, a life long work in progress, is a summation on Kat’s art as well as her views on the tattoo world. “My mom archived everything from my youth and then we photographed over a 100 of my favorite clients. The book also covers everything from tattoo etiquette to tattoo myth-busting.” And what etiquette should you be concerned about? “Everything from not being the inconsiderate cell phone guy to bringing your kids or entourage to bargaining with your tattooer;
stuff like that.”

As for myths to bust, here are a few straight from the source: “That tattoos hurt less if it’s on fattier parts; a lot of people are like ‘if I get it on my ass, it won’t hurt’ but the ass is probably one of the most painful parts of the body to get a tattoo on. Things like: there’s no glow-in-the-dark ink, color doesn’t hurt more than the black and grey, and that if you get your lover’s name tattooed on you, it’s not a curse.”

I ask Kat where her journey began in the land of tattooing. “I got my first tattoo when I was 14. I was hanging out with a lot of punk rock kids and they all had tattoos and we all had a friend who was tattooing all of us with his homemade machine and so it was just one of those things, I wanted to get tattooed.”

Over the years, Kat has embedded her work permanently on many a soul. I ask her if she has a favorite tattoo from all these years of work. “I don’t really have an actual favorite. I think as a tattoo artist, I try to just make every tattoo better than the one before, so if I had to say what my favorite tattoo is, it’d probably be the last one that I did. But I don’t know, there’s not really one that’s better than the others, because they’re all different, you know? It’s all about the content.”

And as with any TV series, each new season has to offer new challenges and promises. As Kat confides, this has been her favorite season so far.“It’s mainly because I just celebrated my first year of being sober and I’m able to focus more and I’m much more centered. I’m probably in the best place I’ve been in my whole entire life. So, I’m really happy about that. And you can see it in the tattoos. With the tattoos for this season, I’m really pushing the envelope and you’ll see bigger and
more creative stuff.”

And she’s not just more focused on her tattoo work, she’s also able to be more focused on her clients, which as she divulges, is one of her favorite parts about being a tattoo artist. “I think the dynamic between artist and client is pretty special. Before, I think it kinda bugged me, having to be a therapist or feeling like you have to be one. But I’ve learned so much from all of my clients. It’s about really paying attention to the fact that somebody chose you to tattoo them and permanently mark them for the rest of their lives. That a pretty big honor, you know? I have this tattoo journal that I’ve been working on for the past year, where, after every person I tattoo, I write about ‘em. You’re spending intimate hours with somebody, and when people get tattooed, 99.9% of the time it’s because it’s a special moment in their life, whether it’s somebody dying or somebody being born. It’s pretty therapeutic, and it’s not always a debbie downer either. So you’re sharing something really important with somebody and even though I’m bad with names, I always remember every tattoo. It definitely is an exchange of energy which can be draining a lot of the time, especially with the heavier stories. But at the end of the tattoo, when I’m able to write in my journal, I’m able to process it a little more and see how it relates to me and my life, and those are some of the most important life lessons I’ve learned. I’ve learned so much about life through these people. So it’s pretty cool, you know?”

The time has come for Kat to return to work as she readies her gloves and opens a tiny case to reveal her special tattoo tools. She seems raring to go, seemingly consumed by the approaching work, her obsession. “I tattoo every day. I’ll do anywhere from three to five tattoos a day, and I normally work from noon to 10pm. As long as I tattoo every day, I’m good, but if I don’t…I freak out.”

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