Life & Work with Ray Angulo

Today we’d like to introduce you to Ray Angulo.

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?
At first, I found my interest in tattooing as I was attending art school in my early twenties in southern California. At first, I could not get an apprenticeship so I started doing it on my own Tattooing friends and whoever wanted a free tattoo. Unfortunately, things were not going well because I really didn’t know what I was doing. After trying for several months and sacrificing many things I hid a rock bottom where I gave up trying to tattoo and almost gave up. It was that day that I prayed to God and told Him that I had no more strength left in me and that I wanted to be a tattoo artist if that was His will. A few days later I was taken as an apprentice at a local tattoo shop. The apprenticeship supposed to last at least a year before I could start tattooing, but fortunately, it only lasted a few months. After that short period, I was hired as a full-time artist and started my professional career in early 2011. Since then I have spent the last ten years working and learning in amazing shops with great artists.

I moved to Arizona from California two years ago and started working at a local tattoo shop. After two years of working there, I felt led to open up my own tattoo studio and start doing something on my own. Tattooing has completely changed my life by giving me an open door of being able to make a living by doing what I love most: art.

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
It was definitely not a smooth road. Especially at the beginning. It was almost impossible to find an apprenticeship, and even if I found one I wouldn’t been able to get paid from it. Usually, when you find a shop that is willing to teach you, the student will have to be the studio’s helper without making a living, so it’s hard to survive financially when you are going through one. After that, it takes time and effort to try to build a clientele. I am glad for all the hard times since it has taught me that ultimately things always work out.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I am a tattoo artist who specializes in “black and grey realism”. This is what my portfolio has been focused ever since I started my career and I am fortunate enough to be recognized for it. I believe that what sets my work apart is the impactful size of the tattoo with the right amount of detail and smooth shading. I like to be able for people to look at a tattoo from far and recognize immediately what the image is portraying.

Can you tell us more about what you were like growing up?
I think I was always an introverted child. I was always interested in drawing when I was a child. I often sat in front of the TV and tried to draw the cartoon characters from the shows. That is how I started practicing drawing. In school, my peers usually asked me to draw things for them while I was going through the early years of my education. Unfortunately, I left art for a large part of my teenage years, and didn’t get back into it until I was in my early twenties.

Contact Info:

• Email: Info@reckontattoo.com
• Website: Reckontattoo.com
• Instagram: RayAnguloTattoo

Image Credits
Adam Farr