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PRESENTS
If we have learned something along centuries of history is that history always leaves a trace.
And we have learned about history due to endless sources of expression that mankind has adopted
and captured in thousands of ways.
But there is one source of expression that without doubt, in all these centuries,
was and still is and object of polemic, disarray, disapproval, fascination, worship
an also addiction.
This can only be achieved by unifying and merging years and years of knowledge, experiences
and historic events which are hard to understand, and can only be captured in such a personal space
as skin itself.
One of the best international tattoo artists, born in Mexico.
I have two sisters, one older than me and one younger. The older one used to say that
I belonged her, but with Maricela, there's an age difference of 1 year and months, so,
being a little girl just learning to speak...in baby's language, MINO means "MÍO" (mine).
When she was asked "who's that kid?" she said, "He's MINO", but really wanting to say
"He's MIO!" (He's mine), and that's how MINO was born. That's how the nickname is born,
which I recall, during high school, trying to shake it of. Even quarrels at home, you know,
but I just couldn't. They never stopped calling me MINO back home.
And now, for 25 years since I started in the tattoo world, it has become my artistic name.
In fact, there's people who swears my name is MINO when it actually is Eduardo Betancourt.
Without a direct influence but attracted by the mysticism of the Tattoo,
MINO turned from a medicine student to the best Mexican tattoo artist in the world.
His first tattoo changes his life completely and he then decides to professionally work as a tattoo artist.
Learning as in every profession, from the basis, up to the culmination of real art.
Just as it was done centuries ago, supervised in every moment by his father,
Dr. Eduardo Betancourt.
My beginnings were with a needle, thread and Indian ink. You may ask yourself "How..., needle, thread and Indian ink?" Well, yes.
I mean, the advantage that I had, by which lots of my "guinea pigs" friends let me tattoo them
was that right behind me there was the backup of a physician
so when I got to do a tattoo, my friends used to say:
"well, it might not end up pretty, but there's the doctor checking nothing happens to us".
Then my father gave me new needles. Brand new, sterile and disposable xylocaine needles.
As they are really thin, they worked perfectly.
You tied thread to the needletip and in capsules you put some Indian ink.
You then soaked the needle in the Indian ink,
stretched out the skin and pushed in the needle tip up to the tread,
not bursting but doing this kind of movement to infiltrate the pigment, to infiltrate that ink.
And in that way, tattoo stitch by stitch.
My beginning was literal, start from the roughest.
I certainly knew tattoo art.
Apart from my first tattoo, the consecutive tattoos I had to tattoo them to myself,
I have 3 tattoos that I made myself, 2 in this forearm and one in the thigh.
Both arm tattoos were made with needle and thread,
because I had to practice.
and obviously not my sisters nor my mother or father,
will offer themselves for me to tattoo them like that.
So I said "well, lets get started, somehow".
and I started to tattoo myself with needle and thread,
cause my father clearly told me:
"The day you come telling me you hurt somebody with and infection
or worst, a disease,
in that moment you stop the nonsense you are doing!"
Then, it was always under his supervision
and logically, that supervision,
let me undergo the medical and healthiness aspects on how to make a tattoo,
which I had since the beginning of my career.
Well, we have Danielle with this tattoo.
The coloured part is something I've done before, in our first session.
The outline was made in the USA.
There were some details we've discussed about some situations,
a couple of lines out of place but there is really not big trouble on that.
So, what we are doing, the project is her whole arm.
we'll colour this flowers, cover the rest of the woman's figure here.
all that in an art nouveau style.
And today I hope to finish the dress and colouring the hair.
So lets get going.
We finished the second session.
We finished the dress completely and started with the hair.
The idea is to make it a brunette,
with some glows in yellow to give it some light.
We started with the top part.
We have to let her skin rest.
which is a process of 3 weeks approximately.
to be able to keep working near the area but never on the area we previously tattoed.
We have to give it a rest.
Well, thanks a lot.