Nikko Hurtado Biography

The portrait realism of Nikko Hurtado or why they leave tattoos business at the very peak of a brilliant career, a real magician of color realism turns its activities ... “Enough, I am leaving,” says Nikko Hurtado Nikko Hurtado, taking photos of his cars to post them at the Internet asocation. For modern tattoo culture, I did everything I could, and now I confess a healthy lifestyle-both spiritually and physically.

” Those who are watching on social networks for Nikko know that recently he was breaking between the gym and tattoos. Yes, I have many wonderful friends in the tattoo-world, but this lifestyle got me, and I need to get away from there forever. ” This was not advertised, but long tattooing sessions undermined the health of the master. Due to the fact that I had to work constantly leaning over the client’s tattoo, the neck muscles were injured, and only recently it became possible to cure it.

For this, Nikko is entirely grateful to his sports instructor who came up with a special training program for him. And he was prescribed glasses! Without deciding who to transfer the right to manage his Black Anchor Collective Tattoo Studio, Nikko Khurtado decided that one of the winners of the Ink Master TV show would receive the keys to her. As far as we understood your grandfather and uncle had artisanal tattoos.

What was this in these tattoos that you yourself became a tattoo? Yes, for me they were simply amazing, although there was nothing special in them, ordinary black and white prison style, and they were made by a sewing needle. But all this was very interesting to me. Grandfather's hand was stripped by the name of the grandmother - Lucy. And now I made myself the same with the name of my daughter.

Grandfather left this world when I was ten years old, and my tattoo is such a small sign of memory about it. Have you been interested in art all your life? Art has always been part of my life. I loved cartoons and comics. When I was small, I liked to draw everything that I saw around, I tried to copy the drawings from the comics. I owe to comics, because redrawing them, the first understanding of the process of creating drawings began to come to me.

I remember that I painted Bart Simpson for all classmates that I liked. This was the beginning of my career. When I matured, I began to appreciate high art. Now I have the opportunity to visit museums of fine art around the world and admire the beautiful painting with your own eyes. I always felt that art is exactly what I needed to do. You painted all childhood, but, despite this, you worked for a long time as a builder before starting a career as a tattoo.

I painted as much as I remember. He attended art lessons at school and even went on Saturdays to classes at the local art center. Because of my financial situation in my youth, I could not finish the higher educational school. Together with a friend, we began to work as a male. I didn’t like it at all, I did not have time to hold a pencil in my hands, but I found out what hard work was and learned to be proud of well -done work.

I appreciate this period of my life and the experience that I gained, but I am very glad that my career has gone in a completely different direction. You are known for your impressive colored portraits. Where does such a passion from a portrait and color come from? I think that this hobby has roots in my youth. I wanted to draw things the way they look in life, to make them as realistic as possible, such as faces.

And this desire turned into a tattoo. I believe that this happened unconsciously. I like how people react to a well -made tattoo. For example, a good portrait reminds you of someone from your family, or a portrait of a celebrity makes you remember the film with her participation. Working with color has always been a challenge for me. This is both difficult and pleasant to get the color that I want.

So that you advise those who begin to study the theory of color? I would recommend colored pencils. The fact is that you cannot immediately achieve the color that you need, you do it gradually. Apply the colors a little and see how they interact with each other. The color circle here will help you very much. In my opinion, in general - the color circle can teach you a lot. Describe your creative process.

When I made portraits of movie stars, everything was very simple: photography, tracing paper, tattoo. Although I still like to make portraits of celebrities, my clients seem to want more large -scale tattoos. Currently, it is more cooperation between me and customers. They come with an idea, sometimes with photographs, and we spend all day on planning and placing a future tattoo on the body.

If this project is large, then the work takes several sessions and will require serious obligations from me and from the client. Do you write perfectly with oil, how does this affect your work of the tattooor?I was engaged in a tattoo before I started painting. The tattoo gave me a lot, for example, the opportunity to travel around the world. I had a great opportunity to see the paintings of old masters live.

In addition, I have many friends who are engaged in painting. And watching them and their work, I rather understand how to achieve more realism in my works than considering other tattoos. I think in the art world there is a lot of information about the method of realistic image. Painting shows me how to add volume to my tattoos and how to use color in various ways. You have been engaged in tattoos from the year.

Tell us about the process of developing your work? Since that time, my tattoos have changed dramatically. Then I did not have any system, and I worked not understanding how to make colors correctly. Since then I have been looking for answers to my questions. On this path there was no one who would tell me: “This is what you need to know in order to achieve a realistic image of color.” It was a test and error method.

I attended tattoos courses, read books, traveled and worked with different artists. It was a useful experience, and I know that the learning process will never be completed. I hope that over time I will continue to grow both as an artist and as a person. You starred in many tattoo shows on television. Do you think participation in these shows helped the promotion of your career?

Yes, then it was interesting to me. And I am grateful to all this for the fact that my work was shown on television around the world. This definitely improved my life, because many people wanted to make a tattoo with me.

Sometimes people recognize me on the street, and this is quite surreal. But in general, participation in the show did not change my views on Tattoo-industrial tattoo because, in the end, I am just a tattoo, and participation in various shows did not affect me either for my work. The funny thing is that in those days when the first series of Los Angeles Ink and Tattoo Wars went on the air, the tattoo on television was banned.

And now, it seems, everyone seeks to get into these shows. People who participating in such a show today were just recently among those who condemned all this. Sometimes someone writes to me that he had followed my career since my first appearance on television, and now he finally turned eighteen, and he wants to make a tattoo with me-this is just fantastic! Or someone never thought about making a tattoo before he saw my work.

It's very cool! What does your waiting sheet look like? In fact, I have no expectation sheet. I get a lot of requests, and I really appreciate each of them. But it is impossible to put each of them in this very sheet. Usually I am making a record for two to three months ahead. If the client has a cool idea, then we can agree and find time to implement it. I choose what will be pleasant and interesting to do.

I have a crazy schedule, and it is very difficult to plan a life for more than a few months in advance. I travel a lot and, at the same time, I try to spend more time with my family. How did you manage to avoid this? Recently, I was engaged exclusively in painting for a couple of months. I had the opportunity to hold several personal exhibitions.