Canadia

I spent the last 8 months painting every chance I got to get ready for this show with Phil Holt, Timothy Hoyer and Lango Oliviera, Im super pumped to be part of this this, not only do I genuinely admire these fellow tattooers and artists but Timothy Hoyer has been a huge influence on my tattoo aesthetic since he tattooed me for the first time way back in 92', and getting to share some wall space feels like part of my life has come full circle. 

All the paintings are liquid acrylic and gouache on Arches paper, I really wanted to do some paintings were I could just concentrate on luminosity which is why they are all black and white, but once I warmed up to the medium I really started feeling like my choice to do everything in black and gray really fit the idea of the pieces and I think I will continue to explore this style. Here are some in-progress pics coupled with the finished product, I will be doing a print run for the show and will be selling some on the web later on, so if you are interested let me know or keep an eye out on here or Instagram for updates.

Inspiration and reference

A few from the last month or so, the tower tattoo is based on a book series called the Dark Tower by Stephen King, the eyeless girl is based on the art of Marco Mazzoni, the zombie sleeve is inspired by Disney ,and demon rape was inspired by a night of drinking...enjoy!

Thanks Sarah!

I was reminded by a customer that Iv been blowing it on updating this thing (thanks Sarah!) So here is everything I could find on the shop computer that I got descent pics of in the last couple of months or so. If anyone out there looks at instagram I put stuff up on there kinda regularly under "santoazul".  Happy New Year!

Animals and insects

A lot of starts recently,and lots heavy drawing days, but here are a few that got finished in the last couple of months.

Instagram

Iv been crazy busy at the shop and added instagram to my life,which is more technology than I can handle in one day. Since the pics on instagram suck I will definetely be posting good ones on here still. Hope you can dig these from the last couple of months. 

Black Metal Worms

Once again,Owls are so fun to do,really animals in general.When Austin first hit me up about a "black metal forest sleeve" I have to admit that I pictured the standard face paint somewhere in there and what not,but he meant more of a folk-ish slant to it like a Burzum album cover,and I have to say that that really took the idea from being a topical cliche to being something that will stand the test of time and Im really happy about that. I had free range for the color sleeve and thats always a challenge to not over think it, so I really tried to make it feel open and airy and very tattoo like with the blossoms, and then letting the worms and bug queen co-exist within that context.

Temple

We took a shop field trip last weekend to go to Temple tattoo and get little jammers from Freddy Corbin, dude was super welcoming and the shop is fucking awesomely staked with eye candy,I got me a gangster tat on my fingers and I would just like to say that Freddy rules, speaking of jammers I feel like this is a nice collection of stuff from recent days,I don't know why some tatters get bummed on doing Owl tattoo's cus those things are super fun, and really, birds are fun to draw in general...and so are dead girls