almost impossible

[Lennart82]

What if, it is nearly impossible to get an apprenticeship? That’s the deal in my country. Artists does not want to teach a potential competitor. My short apprenticeship with my mentor lastet only as long as she started to fear me, steal all of her clients.
I have read a lot of topics on this site, and every response starts with; get an apprenticeship. Talk to your mentor ect. As if, that’s the only way.

But here is the thing. Most tattoo artists in my country, didn’t start out as an apprentices. They learned it from reading books and so on.
I like to think, I have an advantage, since I not only ask artists in my country, But joine forums like this.

[djluxi]

Hey man, i feel you… i am kind of in the same position, maybe even a little worse cause there is not a single artist in my country that i would really love and respect, but they still all act like they r all demigods.

I would suggest u go to some conventions, you can find a lot of artists that u might have never heard of and maybe you ll get lucky there. I found some cool dudes from the neighbour country like that… it can sometimes be faster going across the border then to the other side of your country so dont be strictly limited by your country… sweden is not that far, maybe germany, poland? Also try to at least be in somewhat of a friendly relationship before asking for any kind of help yet alone an apprenticeship… this will usually mean you get a tattoo or two from them.

But hey, i am nowhere qualified to preach here… it is just how i am going about it.

On the other hand, all this scratcher hate is a bit over exagerrated and borders to fear of competition. The fact is that most tattoo artists strated as scratchers and the resources used to be a lot more difficult to come by. What separates the good from the bad is ofc sheer talend and determination. If u stick with something and never stop being hungry for knowledge you are set to be good if not you are gonna suck. And the fact is, that even without an apprenticeship other artists in the industry will not be able to speak or look down on you if produce better work then they do…

So if u ask me the whole scratcher/apprentice thing comes down to quality… you can have a bad mentor and u will come a scratcher out of an apprenticeship, or you can be selfthought but produce superb work and noone will care where u got the knowledge from.

[Lennart82]

Yeah its not easy starting up.

Like the one with the Demigod :D And I totally agree with you. In my country, you have to look long for a good tattoo artist, so most people settle for those below medium tattoo artist with a bad attitude, thinking they are the gods amongst men. A friend of mine worked at a tattoo shop as a floor manager, and one of these “artists” asked her for skin and he would do a project of his own design. Now this project isn’t complete, be course he got bored. Now she is left with an unfinished tattoo and the lines looks like he’s been using a jackhammer.

I’ve seen a tattoo “Scratcher” in my home town, charging what equals to 138 $ per started hour, so if the sessions lasts 1 hour and 15 minutes, its a price of 276 $. This is a very high price for a self-thought tattooist. And her results, well I’m not impressed, but other people are, she’s booked 2 months in advance.

And most in my town are self thought. Started out in their kitchen, and can still make quite a good living. And what I have done so far, on test peoples (I didn’t charge them anything) have surpassed 50 % of the artists in my town. And they charge quite a lot.

On the other hand, there are 2 decent artists, again self thought, that I would consider to be okay.
And here is the bombshell. 1 person, my former mentor, had an apprenticeship 20 years ago in Miami, she were tutored under some guy called jack/Jim or Joe. Also she is a high member of the Danish Tattoo Lauge. Her results are awful, she doesn’t possess any artistic gene in her body. She cant come up with anything original, she goes under the category “copymachine”

When I first got contacted by her, I was really exited, since I knew her background, but haven’t seen her results. I knew she was a member of the Lauge, and that she were tutored in America. So I thought she would be the perfect mentor…. I thought wrong. I knew more about the machine, and the setup, then she did. :O All she talked about were sterilisation and autoclave, cross contamination and ultra sonic. So basically that’s what she thought me. About the machine, the depth, the angle, the ink and so on, well that wasn’t that important, personal preference she said.
Her price 120 $ per hour, but isent 40 $ worth. Her work and results, compared to the self thought “scratcher” (the one who charges 138 pr hour) are very very poor indeed.

But to travel to another country, isn’t an option for me. But maybe visiting a convention could be the way. And there is an artist who specialise in portraits in the northen part of Denmark. Maybe I should get a tattoo or two from him :D

(Oh and if you were wondering on the high prices? Everything in Denmark is just that expensive, due the high tax) :shock:

[Anonymous]

The tattoo appreciation ship which had made an very good and great deal about it is quite very nice one.

[Author]

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