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Mister Drawing's Growing Tattoo Empire

East L.A. Artist'due south Work a Favorite of Superlative Music Stars

Mister Cartoon'south Growing Tattoo Empire

Mister Drawing concentrates on a design in his East L.A. studio. Jeff Rogers, NPR News hide caption

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Jeff Rogers, NPR News

Mister Cartoon'south signature style often incorporates gothic Old English lettering and combinations of vehement and innocent imagery -- such every bit a grin clown holding a smoking pistol. Jeff Rogers, NPR News hibernate caption

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Jeff Rogers, NPR News

Motorcycle enthusiast Erick Hoffman gets both forearms tattooed in Mister Drawing'due south studio. The tattoo creative person won't say how much his designs cost, but there are reports his tattoos can range in toll from $300 to up to $twenty,000. Jeff Rogers, NPR News hibernate caption

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Jeff Rogers, NPR News

In the warehouse district only east of downtown Los Angeles, an creative person is working on his latest masterpiece -- only for this artist, the paintbrush is an electrical tattoo gun, and the canvas is human skin.

"He calls himself Mister Cartoon -- a proper noun that certainly carries more than star power than his given name, Marker Machado," says NPR's Michele Norris. "His richly detailed blackness and grey tattoos have become one of the about sought-after status symbols in the music earth."

Mister Cartoon's art work graces the pare of some of the biggest names in music today. Eminem, Method Man, Travis Barker, the drummer from Blink 182, Justin Timberlake of N-Sync and Beyonce Knowles of Destiny'due south Kid all wearable his work.

Many of Mister Cartoon'due south unique designs are inspired by the crude tattoos inmates of California's prison organisation give each other behind bars. With no access to colored inks, prisoners use watered-downward black ink to create shadows and depth -- a technique called "fine-line" tattooing.

"What sets (Mister Cartoon's) tattoos apart is the intricacy," says Norris. "Details and so stunning they about expect like photographs -- textures so finely drawn they almost appear to exist three-dimensional."

His signature style combines the "cruel and the vulnerable," such equally a grinning clown holding a smoking gun. Mister Cartoon also uses a gothic lettering style called Old English language -- in Chicano street culture, the typeface is a symbol of authorisation and credibility.

In his mid-20s, Mister Cartoon was a street-trained artist, painting murals and silk-screening. He learned how to tattoo from a friend, and when his technique improved he began working with the rap grouping Cypress Hill. But his fame exploded when a rap superstar walked into his studio.

"Cypress Hill got me started as far every bit my outset large name -- Eminem put me over the acme," he tells Norris. "That guy gets his daughter's portrait put on his arm... kind of a dedication to the greatest part of his life."

It was Eminem who gave Mister Drawing the kind of publicity money can't buy. Eminem wears Machado'south tattoos "like a badge of honour, showing them off with muscle shirts and flashing them on magazine covers," Norris says.

Mister Drawing is expanding his small empire to include clothing, jewelry and leather goods under the Joker label -- and business concern is taking off. Nevertheless, it'south the tattooing that really interests Mister Cartoon. "Watching him work every bit he maneuvers his tattoo gun, his trunk is hunched in tight concentration," says Norris. "But on his face, an expression of pure bliss."

Source: https://www.npr.org/2003/01/01/895768/mister-cartoons-growing-tattoo-empire

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