About James KING

“Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life.” –Pablo Picasso

I started my involvement with the art world at a very early age of 3.  My mother was an avid artist who had a collection of amazing pastel portraits she had made in her spare time and I had always been drawn to looking at these.  Studying all the lines and details, trying to decipher how the colours merged and blended to create these beautiful pieces of realistic portraits with such life.

I would copy simple line work images my mother would create for me of dogs and turtles and copy them the best way I could, trying to better my skills even at such a young age, I knew then that this art thing had my full attention and I explored more and more as the years went on.

I began creating comic books and realistic images at 10 years old and by 15 I had stumbled across some art books explaining in great detail the process of blending, shading and detail work in pencil and this was the very start of my love of realism portraits.

I began working at the age of 16 in various jobs and continued my art as a hobby at home with a goal of one day making my hobby my full time job with no idea of how make this a reality.

One day I had been visiting my Nan and walking to her house I went past a Tattoo studio in Aylesbury then Shades of Ink, ran by the late Vince Harris.  He was a character, very energetic and charismatic guy with lots of funny stories and a wealth of knowledge.  He would give me my first glimpse at the tattoo world and my first tattoo ever was done by Vince. I think I had found my calling as he had been very keen to tell me my drawings were great and that I would make an amazing tattooist once taught.

Fast forward a few years I was given an opportunity to work with Vince and I took it with honour, we worked together for two years and I became engrossed in the industry and what I could bring artistically to the plate with his guidance.  I’ll never forget that he gave me a chance and I owe him a lot. 

 From there I moved back to London and worked in various shops for the next 7 years learning as much as I could before opening my very own shop.  

In this time I had some great opportunities from working on Channel 5’s tattoo disaster programme, to working with Lenovo technology integrating tattoos with projections to holding a 45 min talk to 30 Wella’s top hair stylists in the country about creativity and artistry in my chosen career path.  Tattooing has brought me some amazing experiences including travelling around the world tattooing in Toronto, Canada and Las Vegas.

Now I am a travelling artist and guest spot in a couple of location in the Sussex area, I also still work in a private studio in Shoreditch as I have clients in the London area also.

I have customers from all over the country and I bring to them a very personalised service as I like them to have a part in their chosen artwork and involve them in the design process so that they are a part of the final product, even though I am doing the designing and tattooing I have good relationships throughout the process.  

The best way to describe my style would be custom realism with a graphic and illustrative touch, I also enjoy abstract realism too.

If you want to get in contact with me regarding your next tattoo you can reach me by clicking the link below.

Look forward to hearing from you.

James.