Featured Artist Profile - Tim Phelps - Age of Reason

Tim's Tattoo Art Photo Gallery:

View these excellent tattoos by Tim Phelps.

Personal Info:

DOB: 11/12/1979
Marital Status: Married 3 years to my beautiful Pepper
Children: No!
Pets: 2 dogs - S&P Mini-schnauzer, Salty Dog, and a Mini-schnauzer/Lhasa Apso mix, Gracie
Favorite music: Tom Waits, Stone Temple Pilots, Live, Clutch, 00 the Rabbit, Pearl Jam, John Mayer, Led Zeppelin, Ryan Adams, Neutral Milk Hotel
Favorite movie(s): Fight Club, Batman, Batman Begins, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Lord of War, Sin City, The Prestige, Harry Potter
Favorite TV show(s): Family Guy, Ninja Warrior, Futurama, CSI (Vegas)
If you were granted one wish? Off the top of my head, more wishes - I'm greedy

Year You Started Tattooing Professionally and How/Why:

2004 - I love art and wanted to make money doing it.

Favorite Style/Genre of Tattooing:

Realism, painterly style

Tattoo Artists Who Have Inspired You Most:

Tom Renshaw, Shane O'Neill, Bob Tyrell, Eric Merrill...there are new people everyday that inspire me and force me to want to do better, I hope that never stops.

Contemporary Artists Who Inspire You:

Bob Ross, Vargas, any portrait artists

Other Interests and/or Hobbies:

keeping my wife, Pepper, happy and my dogs, painting, bonsai, riding my bicycle

Where You Work and How to Contact You:

Pepper and I opened Age of Reason in January (2008). The shop is mainly custom within an art gallery setting. We don't look like the typical tattoo shops here and we don't act like them either - creative, clean and custom is what we do.

Age of Reason Custom Tattoo and Art Gallery
805 Meadowlark Ln
Goodlettsville, Tn 37072
Shop Webpage: www.myspace.com/ageofreasontattoo
Personal website: www.timphelps.net
Personal MySpace: www.myspace.com/tatsbytim call me at my new shop anytime 615-859-4377, or online at myspace or the website. Pepper or I will get back with you usually within the day.

Personal Thoughts and Advice:

Tattoo schools should be burned to the ground. There is no way that many competent artists can be created in that short a time. Learning to tattoo takes time, it is unlike any other form of art. Painting and drawing you are laying pigment on top of a uniform surface, tattooing you are injecting pigment into a living object. Tattoos live, grow and die all the while changing and you as a tattoo artist must have the forethought to know what the tattoo will do so that it remains looking good for years. You can't learn that half dozen at a time in a half dozen months. You can't completely learn that in a lifetime. I will die still learning to tattoo. That's how it stays interesting.

Adaptation, growth and willingness to listen are requirements for anyone who wants to permanently mark another person's body. We're changing lives here. It's serious. Take the time, find an apprenticeship. Scrub some toilets, sterilize some tubes. For some it's easy, for some it takes a lot. Everybody has their own path in this art form. Lots of the people who taught me to tattoo I have never met. I spent hours looking at magazines and galleries on the internet. Just trying to figure out what these people are doing. Have fun and learn from everyone.

For those artists already established, don't get mad and don't hate. In the words of Bob Ross, if the guy next to you is doing better than you, learn from him and outdo him.

If you are looking to get tattooed, listen to your artist. Make the time and take the time to talk. If an artists vision isn't yours and doesn't make you happy, find a different artist.