Leon Lam, tattoo artist from Lyon, France, settled in Hong Kong in 2008, where he's been living and working and has his own tattoo shop : Alchemink Science Studio.His journey throughout China in 2005 has unquestionably inspired the way he tattoos between lines, points, life and balance.. I had the pleasure to meet him at his brother Travi's own studio, Alchemink Lyon.
The beginnings of a tattoo career
In his early teen years, Leon meets one of his friend's father, a tattooed legionnaire. That is his first encounter with tattooing. From this event is born a real fascination and he makes his first attempts with ink and snap off blade knives. He goes on to graduate in mechanical engineering but knows he doesn’t want to become a factory worker... Leon then goes through a number of seasonal jobs and thanks to a month of berry picking, he can finally purchase his very own dermograph. in 1999, he opens a small studio near Lyon, the downtown city being too expensive to settle in. His neighbor is an artist and gallery owner who introduces him mainly to many Art Brut creators and designers. Their shops are always open and always packed. He makes friends for life among all the artists he meets during that time. Never has Leon pushed a shop's door for work: he settles first and tattoos after! “I've always lived where I tattoo", he says. Technically speaking, he first works only with black ink and freehand, because colored inks and stencils are too expensive. These conditions allow him to learn discipline.
In the early 00's, Leon meets Yann Black, who works in Paris's Tribal Act. "Humanly, Yann Black has revolutionized tattooing." "There is something very Chinese in his stroke". This encounter is a defining moment and from now on, Leon wants to bring life to the stroke through its story and feels a need to reinvent this topic under the influence of Yann’s work, who set a new outlook on drawing in tattooing. His work around the stroke is also enriched by different readings and encounters about Chinese calligraphy.
Travelling as apprenticeship
Tattooing has allowed Leon to travel, make great encounters and better his technique. His venture in China in 2005 has set grounds for how he draws today. So far, In France, Leon had not had any trouble finding work, but when he arrived in China, it all became much more complicated: indeed, his clients were mainly asking for japanese tattoos. According to those around him, he should absolutely settle in the Yunnan province, where he undertakes to go by bicycle. Arrived in a village near the Himalayas, Léon is particularly surprised by what he discovers there: in this village are grouped musicians and artists of many nationalities, coexisting, including European and Japanese. Without any hesitation, he settles there and does most of his tattooing in traveler bars. That is where his work around line and filling will intensify.
When he gets to Beijing, he discovers a huge exhibition and work space dedicated to calligraphy. His interest in the subject is fed by many readings, including the works of artist and author Fabienne Verdier. In Shanghai, Leon discovers Jackson Pollock, thanks to the nickname he is given by many youths interested in his art: "The Pollock of tattooing", as if it were obvious. Moreover, Leon also works as a tour guide. Thanks to this experience, he gathers knowledge about many tribes and their varying traditional garments, which he is fascinated by, especially the women's: hairstyles, hats, jewelry, and clothes form an incredible harmony, completely identifiable from one tribe to another.
Then in 2008, he leaves for Hong Kong and takes the opportunity there to absorb a maximum of artistic techniques, readings, and designs from traditional cultures that allow him to finally settle and ink a wide variety of clients from all around the globe. If he chooses to settle there in particular, it's because he feels he belongs: things appear simpler and easier. He drops his suitcases and takes the time to work , observe other artistic fields, and enrich his own. In Hong Kong, meeting new people happens quickly and easily: his clients really let him freely express himself and that is where he reaches the peak of his artistic evolution.
RELATIONSHIP TO BALANCE AND WORKING WITH THE LINE
If his beginnings as a tattoo artist were as diverse as his clientele was, Leon progressively favored a more abstract style, without however abandoning his figurative technique, always keeping balance in mind with his work on bodies. During his travels, Leon also developed an interest in design, through clothes and traditional accessories, interior design, photography... While in Taiwan, in a dwelling amid the mountains, Leon discovered the Japanese art of wabi-sabi. This space he had previously discovered on the internet had been entirely renovated by an interior designer. There, Leon read many art magazines, architecture and decoration books that had a lot of Japanese references. From then on, he immerged into this art of design and improved his knowledge about wabi-sabi, the art of imperfection, a spiritual and aesthetic concept celebrating imperfection and passing time. "In a society where everyone is expected to be perfect, wabi-sabi allows the acceptance of imperfection. Since beauty is precisely found in imperfection, then everybody is beautiful!". This chapter is a turning point in his creative process: it is the start of his work on the destructuring of the line. "I destructured my line and it allowed me to let go of the anxiety of the perfect line."
The evolution of his technique also goes through the need to appropriate the space: in the places he lives, Leon almost systematically transforms his environment with raw materials: cement, wood... These artistic approaches will participate in advancing his way of tattooing: finding the balance between lines, points and emptiness. It is the destructuring of the line that gradually brings him to the point… His way of tattooing starts from the whole body of his clients, from their overall morphology, always leaving the possibility of changing the tattoo if the customers wants to “extend” and continue their initial project. For example, he will start one arm with the elbow in order to let the field of possibilities open. “I don't draw, never hold a pencil, I mentally visualize my designs” Understanding a project does not necessarily go through the pencil, for the flat surface of the sheet does not match the topography and singularity of the human morphology.
After working a lot around filling, lines and dots (almost) always in black, his meeting with a specific client changed his practice. This tattoo-virgin client, severely burned over a large part of her body is the start of a new stage. How to compose with her scars? How to, at the same time, let this woman's story be seen, and still allowing her to reclaim a damaged body. The question of pain is necessarily asked, just like the one of the concealing -or not- of the scars. "It made me think about the properties of tattoos, it brought me to work on the gray, with more shades. In my head, gray steers away from the mark. So I had to rethink the technique, as if I was drawing nearer the invisible. I wanted something soft and cloudy. Lines hurt, I can feel that pain and I'm not sure it is necessary. It really is that encounter that made my work branch off."
Creating a project
Léon's creative approach goes beyond conventional paths. Indeed, he favors meeting the clients face to face to really build the projects. “The project is really built together, the client gives me all the elements that are necessary to go as far as possible and the tattoo is the result of this experience”. To achieve that, Léon needs to feel “at home”, to create an atmosphere for his customers to feel good. Often he has cooked for them when the sessions lasted a long time and a break was needed. The shop experience seems too restrictive to him, starting with the schedules. He needs to take time, to share with the one he is going to tattoo. The question of the consistency of the project on the body as a whole arises and must be discussed when the client wants “only a sleeve”: it is necessary to making them understand the need of this overview of the naked body without it being perceived as ill-intentioned. “When I suggest a design, I always imagine the result on my naked client, or at specific moments of their life, for women, on their wedding day for example, so that the tattoo does not break the balance even on that day". It is the meeting of the arts of design, fashion, and tattoo culture that also define the way Léon develops his technique. Understanding the overall morphology of each person is an essential step in his creative process. "I work while having fun but also making concessions"...
This concession is not temporal. The organization of a project generally takes place over two days in order to take the time to get to know each other better, to trust each other, it is also from there that this balance will be born, which is essential. This time, which is longer than the "average" appointment for a tattoo, is all the more possible as his clients generally come from afar. Finally, in parallel, the place held by photography in the outcome of the tattoo project retains considerable importance in his creative approach even if it cannot always be fully accomplished, as the projects are done over the long term and a ‘fresh” tattoo is different from a healed one. However, Léon continues to often consider the design of his creations through the prism of the photo of the healed tattoo, a photo that he does not know it will even be taken one day... Nevertheless, the main thing remains the link: “The tattoo is just a pretext to meet…”
