Levi Smith

I have been tattooing for 6 years, starting out at Artistic Tattoo as an apprentice and now back at Artistic Tattoo as it's Shop Manager. I consider myself an artist first, tattooist second, and pursued a professional career as an artist for more than 20 years. I studied Computer Animation and visual communication at the Art Institute of Phoenix, spent 5 years as a professional and freelance Graphic designer, in addition to self-publishing underground comics for approx 6 years (I still have a few more in me). Through all this I've held jobs as a picture framer, framing original pieces from Picasso, Manet, Goya, and Dali (yes, Salvador) and taken a wide variety of Art jobs from window design for restaurants (Haus Murphy's in Glendale, AZ) vinyl graphics, t-shirts, and the like. I am also working on a series of sketchbooks. Art is more than a passion or a job for me, it's an obsession and release valve, and I will continue to make art until well after they put me in the ground. I don't have specific styles or strengths, though I tend to enjoy the dark and disturbed kind of art, skulls, monsters, werewolves, creepy trees, and unusual abstract imagery that provokes a sense of unease.