One of the charms of the tattoo world is the great diversity of the paths of those who have made it their profession. Some more than others carry with them a perfume of adventure and stories that one would listen to for hours. Stéphane Candela is one of them. At 48, the Frenchman from Lyon has already lived several lives. If today, settled in the Var, he passionately focuses on a new school and cartoon style, he tells us how it all started, in Brazil, on the border of the Guyana of the legionnaires.
Tattooing comes by chance in your life. Tell us about it!
I left France when I was 20 and my arrival in South America was quite unexpected. I first worked for a few years in the gold mining industry and, after meeting someone, I bought a wooden shack on the Brazilian side of the border with Guyana for a handful of cherries! This shack was meant to run a restaurant... which I had never done in my life! But I was young, I was 24, and above all I was very happy to have been able to settle in Brazil. So I didn't think too much about it and got to work.
At what point do you go from the restaurant business to tattooing?
I met my wife quite quickly and we shared this adventure together. But after a few years, we became disillusioned, as the amount of work was so great and not so pleasant! So, on the eve of my 30th birthday, I felt that I had to make a decision to change this. I had a friend at the time, a former legionnaire who spent his days talking about tattoos; he wanted to order some equipment to get started. Which is what we ended up doing. That's how, with the help of Brazilian tattooist friends, we took our first steps in the business. Of course, the material was of poor quality and it was very laborious!
How are those first years going?
They were quite catastrophic. The lack of knowledge, the absence of good equipment, at the time we had to weld our needles ourselves, which didn't help matters because badly welded needles automatically meant a failed tattoo! I had to wait two years to start asking for money for my services, before I didn't dare. I even gave some money to my first guinea pigs, stoned guys who were hanging around the streets. They were all happy. I also paid my two Brazilian tattooist friends at the beginning - let's not forget that Brazil is a poor country and that the smallest ticket makes things happen! So after two years I earned a few rupees. It didn't feed the family by any means, but I put them aside and after a year I was able to afford my first trip to the US!
So you feel ready to become a real "professional" tattooist?
Yes. I was doing simple stuff at the beginning and as we had a legion camp right across the street, there was no shortage of clients! The sessions at the time were quite laborious. The legionnaires were keen on tribal and Maori style, which I could handle. But they were usually big rooms and I had some shitty equipment! You have to imagine a small room, made of wooden planks with sheets of metal as a roof, two fans, boiling! We were at the equator, 40° in the shade in the dry season and 98% humidity in the air. On top of that, these poor legionnaires who were drinking overheated red wine brought back from Guyana, were pissing blood and I was dripping in puddles of sweat... Needless to say, the end of the session was difficult. It was literally hell for everyone!
It's a difficult discipline to get into, it's a daring gamble when you have a family to support. What is your state of mind?
When I started I still owned our restaurant. We had built a few rooms behind it to turn it into a small hostel. As labour is cheap in Brazil, I was able to delegate some of the work so that I could devote myself more and more to tattooing! The state of mind I was in 18 years ago is still the same. I thank God I had the opportunity to know this profession. Even with its ups and downs, it's a wonderful job and I'm still learning a lot and meeting new people!
What was your idea of the business before you started?
At the time, tattooing was a way out but, over the years, it has literally changed my life and that of my family. In addition to the exciting side, I was able to travel a lot to the USA, go to conventions, learn more advanced techniques, meet some of the masters of the time and above all become aware of the level. Because we had neither internet nor mobile phone to take pictures of our tattoos. We had to wait until the camera film was full to have it developed!
You realise that you have to learn to draw, something new for you. How do you go about it?
When I realised that I would have to start drawing seriously if I wanted to evolve, I can tell you that it was a bit like everything else: laborious. I didn't have internet and the only source of information we had was a magazine stand with tattoo magazines and comic books (Spiderman, etc.) that I used as a model to understand how the human anatomy worked. I scribbled for years on blank sheets of paper doing a bit of everything and anything, and hoping that one day it would!!!
How does this self-training shape the trajectory of your work and your style?
When you tattoo in Brazil, it's simple: Brazilians see your colour capsules and tell you they want them all. Basically, they give you an idea of their tattoo and then it's up to you to get them all in! You might as well say that you don't get bored with them. So it forced me to eat colour and deal with it. In this context, the newschool style seemed obvious to me! The cartoonish and delirious side, without limits, is superb and the explosion of colours is there. What more could you ask for?
Who are your clients then? How do you deal with Brazilians who want colour on their tanned skin?
It was quite folkloric. No appointment, the Brazilian gets paid and you have to tattoo him immediately, otherwise the money for the tattoo disappears in the bar with your colleagues! So you have to be on your toes and start immediately. There is no time to think about it because there are a lot of people around and we start with a rather tense price negotiation. Everything is a pretext to lower the price. Given the level of pay, we quickly understand why; it is however rather tiring in the long run! As for the colour of the tattoos, they are indeed well tanned and most of the time it's a waste. But it doesn't matter, you have to use colour. No need to add that there will be no money for care, no ointment, very little maintenance and a sick sun, so I let you imagine! Fortunately, women are more attentive and we manage to make some nice pieces!
How do your plans work after that?
With our two children growing up, we realised that we couldn't stay in this region of Brazil, which is extremely poor and very Wild West. So we decided to return to Guyana to open a shop and get back on our feet. Just before leaving, I was able to exchange a cuff for a car to arrive in Guyana motorised... not bad though!
What is it like to arrive in French Guiana?
My family stayed in Brazil for the first year, just long enough for me to settle in Cayenne and run the shop. Some friends gave me free accommodation and advanced me a few rupees to open the shop. And then, the shock. I went from a country with a catastrophic economy, where I was struggling to get a few reais, to the French economy where people have a fairly substantial purchasing power. I will always remember the first tattoo I did. It was a good size, a big tribal on the back. I told the guy it was 800 euros, he said he was OK. I go to collect the money, I don't believe him and 15 mins later he is back with the cash. I'm on my ass! It's simple, at the end of the first week I had all these 50 euro notes spread out on my desk, they were everywhere. I called my wife in Brazil and told her I thought our financial problems were over!
Are the following years going as well?
Yes, they are as good as we expected. There are a lot of soldiers to tattoo and the Guyanese are also there. I have a very busy schedule and I even set up a project to move to the United States... which finally turned sour! Anyway. The time in Guyana was very cool, even if I didn't really get to know other tattoo artists. It was a bit of a closed shop at the time and I wasn't necessarily welcome at first, but nothing too bad! In the end we stayed for six years. Then, as we had enough money, we went back to the south of France to settle in La Farlède (Var) where we have been for six years. Starting from scratch each time!
Have you kept in touch with Brazil?
The local tattoo artists had become friends. We still talk via WhatsApp. It was a great experience, they even introduced me to a Brazilian tattoo legend at the time, Carlos Cabral (Instagram: @carloscabraltattoos), who was from back home, but working in Sao Paulo with the monsters. He travelled all over the world, knew Paul booth in the USA. He also lived in Spain and Ireland I think. Now he doesn't work much, but back then he was on the front page of all the tattoo magazines!
How do you feel about the democratisation of tattooing?
Personally, I think there has been a lot of good in this regard. The democratization has allowed a radical evolution of the material, the artists, the styles. Many people complain about the opening of shops on the right or left that would make them lose customers. But I find that competition is a good way to get a kick in the ass! How many clients have I had coming back from other shops who were refused to do their tattoo?
Where are you with drawing today? What are your aspirations?
Since I arrived in Europe, I have been enrolling in serious training courses. It was time to catch up! As I work full time all year round, it's impossible for me to go to school or to an internship. As a result, online training seemed to be the most accessible. Unfortunately, until a few years ago, you couldn't find anything serious. But I had spotted this website, Schoolism, run by Bobbi Chiu, an online school that aims to train future cartoonists in Hollywood. In exchange for a few dollars, you get to take classes with the elite of Hollywood animation! Three-month courses with weekly feedback on your drawings. I learned a lot. But it was very hard. The first few years, I was up at 3am with classes until 8am before taking the kids to school and opening the shop to work all day at a good pace. Because life in France is expensive, as you know! So exhausting !!!
We see more drawings than tattoos on your Instagram account nowadays. How do you divide your time between these activities?
You can't change a winning team. I'm always up very early. I get up at 4:30am and draw until 9am. Then I spend the rest of the day in the shop tattooing, of course. There's a catch to all these courses though. They are more oriented towards animation drawing than tattooing and, over the years, I have to admit that I got a bit lost. So if today drawing is more present, it's due to the fact that I put the priority on my trainings... And there is still so much to learn! I hope that one day I'll finally be able to put all these years of learning to use in tattooing in a cartoon style. That's my goal !!!! I remember an anecdote from Brazil. To learn how to manage with my drawings, I started selling buffalo skulls (which I recovered from the dump and which spent several weeks at the bottom of the river) with a painting of their choice on them, on order to legionnaires and tourists. I was asked for anything and everything, that allowed me to paint, to learn to play with colours and to earn 3 rounds 4 pennies! Hence the name ART SKULL (the art of skulls instead of the art school (ART SCHOOL)), a little play on words that became ART SKULL TATTOO!
Which tattoo artists or designers are you looking at today?
As far as my inspirations are concerned, they are very varied. It goes from video games (Nicolas Saviori, Max Grecke, Catell Ruz), to illustration (Laurent Durieux, Sandro Cleuzo), to tattooing (Jamie Ris, Victor Chill, Starabroda, Dimitri HK) and of course cinema (Stephen Silver, Woulter Tulp, Sam Nielson, Bobby Chiu).
You have an apprentice, Gaston. Was passing on something you wanted to do?
Gaston came to the shop already knowing how to tattoo, I just gave him the line to follow in terms of drawing. I was alone in the shop and full time. I wanted to work with other people, I was fed up with this solitude. So we got to know each other and we complement each other. He does a lot of conventions, he brings me a lot of technical news, not only about equipment but also about tattooing techniques, because he has already worked in several shops. In short, new blood is good!
Apprenticeship, alternation, do you have a point of view on the question of the training of future tattooers?
Every apprentice tattooist has an affinity and should be trained accordingly. The tattoo business has become so big that it's hard to know how to train a good tattooist. What style is it for? It doesn't really matter what kind of training you get in the end. What is most important is the path that the tattoo artist in training wants to take. And to train accordingly! + Art Skull Tattoo 54, av. de la République 83210 La Farlède IG : @artskulltattoo
