A chit chat session with Goutham Ramesh: Everything you need to know about the life of a tattoo artist

If you ever wondered, what it is about tattoos and the tattoo artists as a whole and about their life, look no further! Just a few days back, we had the pleasure of interviewing one of the topmost tattoo artists of Bangalore, Goutham Ramesh, on our Instagram Live that happens every alternate week.

Goutham is specialized in artwork, colorwork, dark realistic, and cover-up tattoos with a wholesome 16 years of experience in the industry! Cool, right?
In this quick chit-chat session, we covered topics about his life, journey, and many more as a tattoo artist.

And here is the sneak peek of the interaction we had with Goutham below!

Without further ado, let's dive deep into it!

What inspired you to be a tattoo artist?

It all started in the 7th or 8th grade when I used to create handmade tattoo machines and drew tattoos on the wrists of my friends and classmates, and that's how my love and interest for tattoos grew.
It was then when I finally realized what an incredible medium of art tattooing actually was, and that's it. There was never going back! I gradually pursued it even further, with my main focus on building my tattoo skills.
During that entire journey, my friends were highly supportive and encouraged me to take up this art, and it was eventually really addictive too!
So that's how it started! My journey with tattoos!

Where do you get inspiration for your tattoos?

Initially, everything started with copying designs from google or other tattoo artists, which is eventually a copy-paste. However, things have changed now since numerous platforms and websites offer incredible perspectives and vision on objects you can get inspired from and create tattoos!

The way to make progress here is to keep on practicing, sketch and understand the format of the tattoos, and you are good to go!

What do you like the most about your job?

Some of the most rewarding and enriching aspects of being a tattoo artist are the fact that I can spread art and give my customers good memories that they can actually hold on to for the rest of their lives through tattoos!
Also, it’s almost like you are getting paid for doing what you love, which is quite rare in most professions!
You have zero stress, limitations, boundaries, and lastly, no boss or superiors to add pressure on you for work! You get to work as per your will and your schedules!
Lastly, you also get to learn a lot out of every custom work for your client, which will eventually help you hone your skills.

What is the most challenging part of your job?

Patience and time.

You need to schedule all your appointments and proceedings beforehand. You need to make strict deadlines regarding the completion of one appointment and proceeding to the next one.

And the style.

Agility and resilience are highly crucial for a tattoo artist.
Suppose you are into realistic tattoo art, but your customer asks for a geometrical neo-traditional tattoo or pretty much anything. In that case, you should be highly adaptable and be ready to switch it to any pattern or texture without any hesitance. Also, have full confidence about it and ace your tattoos!

What is the most rewarding part of your job?

Previously it was just YouTube videos that we had for learning the skill, which is not the best way to go about it. It is certainly tough and challenging to just watch a video, research everything and grasp every idea through it.

However, several tattoo studios and institutes are currently running, ready to impart their knowledge on tattoos and help them learn the skill.

What I have been doing nowadays is just grasp the new methods, experiment on them, work on them and convey them to my fellow artists. It could be even the tiniest things like the shade works, line works, and many more.
This was never possible with YouTube since what you see on videos does not really end up on the skin in the same way. It is always different!
And I have constantly been working and practicing on it. And whatever techniques work for me or give me results, I share those ideas with my fellow artists.
It's not just me, though. I take valid points from them too to enhance my knowledge!

All in all, the knowledge I gained eventually is one of the most rewarding aspects of my tattoo journey!

Do you have a mentor?

The Internet is my mentor!
Everything you will need is readily available on the Internet.
There are thousands of people spreading information on the internet, and I am open to gain knowledge from all of them.

What education skills do you think are required to be a tattoo artist?

One of the essential aspects that you need to be skilled at is proper communication. It will help you create perfect bonding with the clients to deliver them the best quality work by the end of the day.
If something is not gonna work, you need to convey it to the client in the best possible manner. This will prevent you from any tattoo fails or issues that might occur later.

Apart from that, if you plan to be a tattoo artist for a long time, I suggest starting with any fine art institute, which will give you a proper art background. This will eventually help them in converting digital art into the skin effortlessly!
Most of the successful tattoo artists in Bangalore are from ChitrakalaParishath.
You just need to develop the knowledge of art, and once you have it, it will be easy for you to go for the skin!

What are the struggles you had to face on your journey to being a tattoo artist?

There wasn't much hype about tattoos when I started, and people were not much aware of it yet. None of our parents would have even allowed it.
Nonetheless, this generation is much luckier since the awareness of tattoos has improved drastically amongst the common people. There are dedicated tattoo studios and institutes out there who mentor aspirants on pursuing their tattoo careers!

Any advice that you would like to offer to someone who would want to pursue tattooing as a career?

Nowadays, our field is very open and welcoming. The only advice I would love to give to the upcoming artists is to be patient and open to learning and gathering ideas from both seniors and juniors of your industry!
This will help in learning new skills and gain experience!

What are your views on TattooPedia?

It is an amazing platform where clients get to meet the artists directly and analyse their specialization and experiences beforehand! It will help them in choosing the most suitable artist for their tattoos.
Also, TattooPedia is promoting both beginner tattoo artists and experienced ones! This is an excellent initiative since other tattoo community pages out there do not really allow specific tattoo artists, which instantly creates a boundary.
Also, with TattooPedia, you get every possible information about tattoos and tattoo inspirations under one umbrella. Hence, you do not need to scroll through your Insta feed all day!
I suggest all my tattoo artist friends follow and share things on TattooPedia and make this community even more successful!

Wrapping Up

And here is a wrap to the entire session with Goutham! We wholeheartedly thank him for spending his valuable time and sharing his thoughts and a glimpse of his journey with us. It was a fun time with a real dose of inspiration and knowledge about everything you need to know about the tattoo industry right from a renowned tattoo artist himself!
You can also check out our recorded live session with Goutham, which is available on our Instagram page.
Hit the follow button, too, if you don't want to miss out on more such interesting conversations and interactions with the top tattoo artists across the country!

Till then, stay safe and happy tattooing!

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