My name is Louis Santos. I was born and raised in Brazil and I have been living in the UK since 1999. I started tattooing in 2006 but my passion for art and all things creative started at a very young age.
The first artist that ever inspired me was a man called Frank Frazetta. In my opinion he was the first artist to draw comic book characters really well. I will always remember the first picture of his that I saw, it was a picture of Conan and I must have been around 6 years old at the time. It had a huge impact on me, even at such a young age.
By the age of 14 I had become a big fan of comics. I loved reading them and I particularly loved the art work by Alex Ross and Todd McFarlane. This is when I started to draw. I used to create my own characters but I would also copy the work of the artists I admired. At this point I decided that I would like to be a comic artist myself.
Then around the same age I discovered the heavy metal music scene, and this opened my eyes to the world of tattoo’s. I didn’t consider a career as a tattoo artist at this point, because I didn’t really know anything about it, and I knew my family would not approve. But the art work I saw in tattoo’s was an inspiration to me none the less.
At the age of 17 I came to England to live with my mum and my step dad. I noticed immediately that the tattoo industry was much bigger in the UK than it was in Brazil.
I met so many people with tattoo’s and I knew that I wanted to get a tattoo as soon as possible. So at the age of 18 I got my first tattoo and from there I started to draw my own designs. I actually got tattooed by someone who couldn’t even draw, they used flash designs that had been created by other artists, and this really got me thinking about the possibility of tattooing as a career. I started to understand then, how important it is to be a good artist before you can be a good tattoo artist.
I started tattooing in 2006, everything I had learned was self taught. In the beginning of my career I did what a lot of tattoo artists do, and I worked with flash designs.
Then I met a tattoo artist called Butch, and he taught me about custom design tattooing, he inspired me and he helped me to improve my artistic capabilities. At this point I made the decision that I wanted to move away from flash designs and concentrate on custom design art work for my clients.
In 2013 I decided to set up my own business and I knew that I wanted my tattoo studio to be completely private. I believe this is the best way to tattoo as it allows me to give my clients my full and undivided attention.
I am very fortunate, and consider myself to be very lucky to have such fantastic clients. I genuinely feel that I always have good people around me and they inspire me to learn more and to improve my skills every single day. I am happy to dedicate my own time to my clients custom designs because this allows me to grow as an artist, and it gives me a real sense of job satisfaction when I see how happy they are with their tattoo’s.
Art is my life.