Art becomes an even more personal and intimate expression when the canvas is the skin.
It takes two to create a good tattoo. There must be an element of trust and dedication on the part of the tattoo artist and the tattooed person.
“You have to have the ideas, the desire, the desire, the financial means and all of the above to get a tattoo done,” said Zeke Ink tattoo artist Nathan Froehlich. “You have to sit there and suffer my torture. You have to go through the process. You should learn as much from this as I am learning. So if they can’t sit down and do it, I can’t do my best.
Tom Pingel travels weekly from Fargo, North Dakota to get tattooed by Froehlich. Currently, Pingel is working up to a full-color sleeve, connected to a back that meets his other arm tattoo.
“I bring in photos that are kind of what I want, and then I just say, ‘Rotate them. Do whatever you want to make it work,” Pingel said. “There is a lot of understanding. We communicate, we talk about it, and then he goes crazy. It’s always a moment of pleasure even if the pain is there.
Fargo, ND, resident Tom Pingel visits Wahpeton weekly to get more ink added to his sleeve.
Froehlich, 49, has built his profile as a top tattoo artist in and around the Red River Valley over the past decade. After spending time with Golden Dragon Tattoo in Fargo, Froehlich took a position with Zeke Ink Tattoo in Wahpeton a few months ago to be closer to his home in Fergus Falls, Minnesota.
He’s always been an artist, but Froehlich only started tattooing 10 years ago.
“Never in a million years would I have thought of being a tattoo artist, and now I wish I had done it 20 years ago,” Froehlich said.
Before becoming a tattoo artist, Froehlich worked in multimedia computer graphics and web development. He owned his own sign shop for 14 years.
“(The tattoo) is really the only tangible thing, when you can have a product in front of you and you can talk to it and you get feedback versus a website, where you build it and nobody even cares about who built it,” Froehlich mentioned. “This is different. You get a little more recognition.
Tattooing is a constantly evolving field, including continual improvements in ink and machinery.
Froehlich started tattooing due to pressure from his friends. Even though he was convinced he couldn’t make a living as a tattoo artist, Froehlich ordered a tattoo machine. When he arrived in the mail, he did a tattoo on his own foot, then got his apprenticeship the next day.
He was thrust into the world of ink, and it quickly consumed him.
“Tattooing isn’t really a job, it’s a way of life. You eat it, live it and breathe it. You go to Walmart, you talk about tattoos. You go to fast food, you talk about tattoos. You make an appointment at the city dump, you talk about tattoos. You eat it, live it and breathe it. It’s the only job I’ve ever had that I never said, “Oh man, I have to go to work today.” It’s always, ‘I have to go to work today,'” he said.
When Froehlich started tattooing, it changed everything, including his family dynamic. His daughter, Kilee Gutzmer, has now started her apprenticeship with him in the shop. Zeke Ink Tattoo owner Laura Richard said her son, Austin Richard, also fell into the world following his father’s death.
“He was never interested in tattooing, even in college or all the years his dad had a shop. And I think that became a bond between him and his dad,” Laura Richard said.
Now Laura Richard’s daughter has also started practicing her lines at home. Tattooing has become a family affair for the Wahpeton boutique.
While Froehlich spends most of his time at Zeke Ink Tattoo, he secured a guest-in-residence spot five years ago at Doc’s Tattooz in Marathon, Florida, and will occasionally visit there to get tattooed. Froehlich said he probably had a friend in every state he could call who would let him tattoo at their shop because the world of ink is so interconnected. He also launches it occasionally with the artists of Love Hate Miami, made famous by the reality show “Miami Ink”.
“When I started tattooing, it was the show I watched to learn anything. I had no idea what I was doing and was hesitant to know if I even wanted to do it. Then , I started watching these guys and seeing how much fun they were having and the art they were creating, and I was done with that,” Froehlich said.
The tattoo opened up many unique experiences for her. Froehlich inked all of the band members of Saving Abel, a rock band from Memphis, Tennessee. The band even made him a VIP, and if he ever goes to a gig, he can hop right on their tour bus.
“Even this kind of opportunity that I never thought would come up, especially being a little someone from Minnesota in the middle of nowhere, you know?” he said.
Froehlich believes tattooing can be for everyone, and the shop lives up to that philosophy. Zeke Ink Tattoo does camouflage patches on self-harm scars and mastectomy scars.
“I don’t know how these people always get to us, but it’s kind of a connection. It’s just out there in the world that we can and will understand and stand together,” Richard said.
Froehlich also works with a program that conceals human sex trafficking tattoos if a victim has been branded.
“I can give that part of their body back to them,” Froehlich said.
Zeke Ink Tattoo is largely about giving back to the community and including everyone who walks through their door.
Austin Richard is soon to get a tattoo on a non-verbal autistic man, whose mother says he always expressed how much he wanted one.
“She could never find a store that would get her a tattoo,” Laura Richard said. “If we have to block out an entire day, we’ll just take our time. Mom was over the moon. »
Some of Froehlich’s most memorable tattoos come from unexpected clients or the deeper meaning of a piece of art. Her very first portrait tattoo was on a 56-year-old woman in remembrance of her late brother. The reference image she brought was missing half of her brother’s head, so Froehlich had to reconstruct the hair, ear, and side of his face.
“She went home to her mum, who was 97, and the mum started crying and she said, ‘How could you have a picture of my boy on your back?'”
Those moments stay with an artist, Froehlich said. He enjoys giving his clients the gift of a loved one etched into their skin, or covering painful memories in beautiful art. The looks on his client’s faces are worth more to him than money could ever be, he said.
“Some people come here because of a tragedy. Some people come here because it’s new. Whatever the reason, you want to make sure it’s a good experience, not a hurtful or traumatic one,” Laura Richard said.