Aaron Walker is a professional tattoo artist with a private studio in downtown Little Rock. He specializes in color tattoos, particularly watercolor.

"Whenever I first started tattooing, I did a lot of color tattoos in general. I wanted to do a style called New School, which is very cartoony, almost based off of graffiti. And, I still love that style. It's a lot of fun to tattoo. But I got asked to do a couple of watercolor tattoos. And I had a lot of fun doing them. I was probably in like my first few years of tattooing and then one day I thought to myself that I had a lot of fun doing them and just wanted to keep doing them, so I told myself that some styles aren't for everybody and there should always be somebody that wants to be good at certain styles. Like for example, there's people that started doing tribal in the 90s, and they still to this day do it. I just started thinking to myself my style isn't for everybody, and that's completely fine. I necessarily don't want to be a black and gray artist. Or, you know, any other kind of style. You could name any style, really. But, while I can do black and gray, it's not what I want to specialize in. There's people out there that definitely can do watercolor, but it's probably not what they want to do every day either, so, you might as well have somebody that's gonna want to do it and try their best to be really great at it, and that's what I sought out to do." - Aaron Walker

Watch Aaron give me the tattoo on YouTube Here: https://youtu.be/qslGcx8uHmQ

Find out more about Aaron:
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/aaronwalkertattoos/
Website - https://www.instagram.com/aaronwalkertattoos/

Find out more about Elizabeth and Sustaining Craft:
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/sustainingcraft/
Facebook - http://facebook.com/sustainingcraft
Website - https://www.sustainingcraft.com

Special Guest: Aaron Walker.

"I don’t need to do an all-day eight hour event where I actually get up at 6 am to prep and then get there at 7 and the event starts at 9 and then I stay until 5 and tear down at 6. It’s hit or miss if I’m going to make fifty bucks or three hundred bucks. Is that worth my energy? At this point, not really. I do still have a full-time job so I’m grateful that I’m able to be more selective about my freelance and these vendor events. And with that, like I said, I’m not posting as much on instagram about my personal art because I’m relearning how to love art. I feel like I had to take that step back. Because it was, everything needed to be, how many likes did I get, or who is sharing it? I saw my friend share somebody else’s art but they didn’t share my art. And it was becoming a shitty comparison game that nobody wants. I love all of my friends’ art and I’m like, they should be sharing because they’re amazing. It was never a, ‘I feel in competition with them’, it was just a ‘I’m being behind’ feeling. With that, I think it was, I am putting too much pressure on myself. And I think it goes back to the pandemic. I took that two years to really relearn who I was. And part of that was, what did I like about being an artist as a kid? That was: sitting in my room, listening to music and figure drawing." - Katy Raines

Listen to her previous episode here: https://sustainingcraft.fireside.fm/13
Read here: https://hewandweld.com/katy-raines/

Join Katy and a group of talented artists this Friday, August 11, for the last Second Friday Art Night Afterhours of the year. To apply for next year’s events, email the Downtown Little Rock Partnership at downtownpartnership@downtownlr.com or Katy at WhatTheKaty@Gmail.Com.

Find out more about Katy:
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/whatthekaty
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/whatthekaty
2nd Friday Art Night - https://www.facebook.com/2ndFridayArtNight
After Hours - https://www.facebook.com/events/740123451446905/740123454780238/?acontext=%7B%22event_action_history%22%3A%5B%7B%22surface%22%3A%22home%22%7D%2C%7B%22mechanism%22%3A%22search_results%22%2C%22surface%22%3A%22search%22%7D%5D%2C%22ref_notif_type%22%3Anull%7D

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/sustainingcraft/
Facebook - http://facebook.com/sustainingcraft
Website - https://www.sustainingcraft.com

Special Guest: Katy Raines.

“I think it has a lot to do with my own personal taste in jewelry,” Stacey said. “I typically wear things that are small and discrete, and I think a lot of other people appreciate that, too. But my attitude is not small or discrete. It's a little combination of the inner and outer me.”

She worked full-time as the communications director for the Thea Foundation while making jewelry every hour she wasn’t at work. As of February 2019, she decided to transition to jewelry design full-time with her company, Bang-Up Betty.

Find more of Stacey’s work:
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/bangupbetty/
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/bangupbettyjewelry
Website - https://www.bangupbetty.com/
Pinterest - https://www.pinterest.com/BangUpBetty/
Stifft Station Gifts - https://www.stifftstationgifts.com/

Sustaining Craft is a passion project of Hew & Weld Writing. There are no fees for artists and craftspeople to participate. Music provided by Jim Ciago (Seven Second Chance on iTunes and Spotify & Nomad Neighbors in the Denver area most weekends).
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/sustainingcraft/
Facebook - http://facebook.com/sustainingcraft

Find more from Hew & Weld:
Website - https://www.hewandweld.com/news
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/hewandweld/
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/hewandweld/

Special Guest: Stacey Bowers.