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Tim Hendricks
The Beginning...
Interview by Kore Flatmo
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Born and raised in Southern California, Tim Hendricks’
tattooing has become a great example of the area’s two most
dominant influences, refined black and grey and bold color. At
29 years old, with about 12 years professional experience,He’
says he’s just beginning, with the best years yet to come. On a
recent trip to Los Angeles, I had a chance to sit down with him
for a brief conversation.
You are one of the most highly regarded tattooists I
know, the work you’ve been doing speaks for itself, but really off
the West Coast, not a lot of people have seen your stuff. Lately
though you’ve raised your profile a bit, especially through your
website. It’s working, I had some clients in the other day and
the whole time I was tattooing them they were raving about you.
[laughs] Yeah, I’ve done the website. But, you know what?
I know what has helped me a lot is I’m kinda riding off of Chris
and Kat’s coattails, but not trying to in any way. It’s just kinda
happening that way. You know? They have brought a lot of
attention to my tattooing, to all tattooing really. Also definitely
working at True Tattoo, even though I left, that helped a lot.
It seems in your career so far you’ve gained ground
exponentially. From the moment I saw Kat’s leg I knew your
work was on a higher level. But over the years you’ve gotten
so much stronger. When you did that portrait of Oliver on her, I
happened to be there before you started. You chatted with all
of us while you made a quick drawing, looked at the picture
and the way you digested that and put it back out is unreal
to me. You really captured a pretty difficult portrait beautifully,
you seem to have this innate understanding for that.
You know what? If I would’ve put too much
thought into it... I think that’s a problem I had
for a real long time, over thinking things. I
always loved portraits and actually, the
first tattoos that I ever did were portraits.
And I think when I started finally getting
better, or at least being happier with
my own work with portraits is when I
just relaxed. It also goes
back to what you said a while back, which is something that I
read of yours, is that you stopped caring. Not stopped caring…
just stop caring too much, it’s almost like... I don’t know how
to describe it, once you learn to relax. Once you stop looking
at it as a test and stop caring about trying to make it look
exact, that’s when my portraits, to me, that’s when I thought
my portraits kept getting better. You know what I mean? I
really did stop caring. I think maybe drinking alcohol during a
certain era—during a certain time that helped out a lot.
[laughs] But I think that’s part of the charm of the work
I see you do. It’s reminiscent of this accurate yet romanticized
nostalgic looking stuff, elegant like those hand-tinted photos
used to be. Okay, here’s our loved one and let’s portray them
in a really kind light, let’s give them something sentimental.
It’s not just to get the information on there accurately, there
is also an emotional effect that you want to achieve.
Yeah, exactly. So when I do that portrait I do really subtle
things to it. Maybe I’ll loosen up the crow’s feet around the
eyes. I’ll shrink her chin down just a tiny bit—things that I
think it needs… Because when it transfers to a tattoo now
suddenly it’s not a photo, now suddenly it’s not really her, it’s
a tattoo. And so I try to do little things. If I see a shade or I’m
like, “You know, it would look better with a little darker shade
in there or here.” So now I try to not just replicate the photo. I
try to improve upon it. And then there’s sometimes where I’m
just like, “I don’t think I could improve upon this.”
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