Derek Zielinski
You’ve been tattooing for
almost 13 years now. How
did you get into tattooing?
Schooling or did you just fall
into it?
No schooling, actually I got
into body mods and tattoos
when I was about 14 or 16
years old through BMX and
punk rock shows and started
making friends with people
who had tattoos and they
started inviting me to the tat-
too shop with them. I made
friends with a bunch of tat-
tooers after I got my first one
and I would hang out with
and draw with them. One
walked by and said “Hey man, that’s pretty cool, ever think of being a tat-
tooer?” I said “not really” and he said I should so I thanked him and asked
if he wanted to teach me and he said no. I thought why would you say
that and not be willing to teach me. That sparked the idea to be a tattoo
artist. For the next 2 ½ -3 years I kinda searched for an apprenticeship
but never really put the time into it but when I relocated to Georgia for a
while I found a guy there who was willing to teach me and that’s where it
began.
How would you describe your style?
A little bit of everything. I would say illustrative realism. When I do get
to do full on custom work it’s heavy line work and bold traditional blacks
but I do a lot of realistic blends and shading. I like the real factor of visual
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