Looking for your next tattoo? Why not try going “stick-n-poke”. This non-electric method of tattooing is done freestyle with needle and ink and is said to be less painful. Tatiana Kartomten (AKA Tati Compton) is THE master when it comes to hand poking. The California-born tattoo artist experimented with a home-made stick and poke art in her early twenties, and has fully mastered her craft turning into a professional career.
But oddly enough, her career sort of started by mistake. “I started doing tattoos on an impetus – for an experience or out of boredom or from a feeling and it didn’t really matter how it looked or turned out,” she told Tattoo Life. “It was more about the act and experience. It was free – I didn’t have to ask anyone for anything – It was DIY, it was immediate, and it was fun. I don’t know how to use a machine, this is the only way I know how to tattoo.”
Obsessed with tattoos from a young age, she says she’s always wanted them and would put temporary tattoos all over her body when she was in elementary school. And in a true DIY spirit, her first tattoo was also the first time she practiced tattooing. “It was with my friend Moses at his house and we were listening to Metallica, we gave each other matching dots on our fingers and wrist,” she says.
Her tattoos span from whimsical psychedelia to powerful silhouettes of women. Check them out in the gallery below:
