Today we’d like to introduce you to Kenneth Rodriguez
Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
Ever since I can remember, drawing has always been something that I can easily resonate with. There’s something about it that makes me forget about everything else. All that matters in the moment is a blank sheet of paper and me. As I grew up, I had the opportunity to take various courses of Anatomy, Light and shadow, etc. These all helped me define and grow my skills, as well as meet other amazing artists. Although my feeling towards drawing never changed, I did forget about it for a few years. Up until Covid came. I spent days inside my house doing nothing, until one day I picked up a pencil again. It reminded me of how passionate I used to be towards drawing, or art in general. I decided to start up again by drawing portraits of celebrities. This eventually started gaining attention in social media, so I decided to follow that path. In 2021, tattoos caught my attention. After doing research and talking to fellow artists, such as @Catasink, I decided to buy myself the equipment and start tattooing. I remember like yesterday the first day I tattooed myself. It was an absolute horrible experience, but one that I wouldn’t change for anything. It helped me get rid of the fear of failing, of damaging the skin of another person. Thanks to some crazy friends of mine, I was able to practice, until eventually become good enough to gain the trust of strangers, that turned into customers, and some, that turned into a friendship. It’s been almost 4 years since I started tattooing, and it’s been one of the decisions I have ever made.
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
Just like someone starting a new skill, my tattoo career has not been smooth at all. A few artists have been kind enough to show me techniques and answer my questions, but I’ve been mostly self taught. I have had to do plenty of experiments with needles, inks, and types of skin in order for me to understand as best as I can how will the tattoo heal, how will it look in a year or two, etc. On the positive side, doing all of this has taught me discipline and patience.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
Drawing wise, my specialization are portraits. There’s something about adding endless details to a drawing that calms my mind, to go into a space where time doesn’t exist. Making a drawing as realistic as possible is not something everyone is willing to do. You need to have plenty of patience to project the idea in your head. Now, tattoos are a completely different story. With drawing, I can start, and stop at whichever time of the day, erase, start over, etc, as many times as I want. With tattoos, I can’t do any of that. I need to considerer the client’s needs, skin type, space available, placement in the body, and the list goes on. Which is why I enjoy it so much. Is not as simple as drawing on skin. You need to consider many variables in order to make a successful tattoo. One of them being that adding as many details as you want is not possible. It’s important to keep in mind that the goal is to make a tattoo that will easily last 5 years, considering that the skin is in constant development, sun exposure, how the client will take care of it, etc.
Pricing:
- One 6 hour session= $500
- Multiple 6 hour session= $400 each
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/krtstudio
