Custom Ink

Like so many kids from the 80s, tattoos always fascinated Emmanuel Hele.

Growing up in California’s Central Valley, tattoo was the purview of outsiders – bikers, gangsters, outlaws, freaks, rockers, and travelers. Aside from the mystique of the craft –which was, at the time, virtually impenetrable - that outsider legacy called to him.

Throughout the 90s, he became increasingly fascinated by outsider subcultures and body modification and he soaked up everything he could about the insular world of tattooing. He read tattoo magazines, hung out at the piercing shop, and talked to gangbangers and ex-cons who tattooed and had tattoos. At the time, the tattoo trade was undergoing a revolution; hip hop culture and new color palettes were breaking into the craft. A once slow-moving evolution was growing by leaps and bounds as new blood flooded in, bringing pushing the craft forward with new ideas, influences, and possibilities in perspective and style. The old guard - who loved to tell you “that’s not possible” - were being challenged by a new generation of artists who dared to push the craft in new directions.

As a new global culture emerged in the 00s, tattoo culture began to rediscover its spiritual legacies, and form-fitting blackwork and large-scale ornament began to make its way back into the culture en masse. These new forms fused with the quality, aesthetics, and ethics of the 90s, and the digital dissemination of new styles and techniques helped to create the tattoo renaissance of the time. In 2009, inspired by the explosion in innovation, Emmanuel traded in his import business for a tattoo apprenticeship. He began tattooing professionally in 2010 and spent his first decade working in custom shops in Portland’s inner east side.

In 2022, he opened Tumbleweed Tattoo - a private, off-street studio dedicated to providing a highly personalized and collaborative tattoo experience. Here, Emmanuel specializes in large scale black and grey ornament. In this practice he strives to meet new clients where they are in their tattoo journey, and embraces a spectrum of projects from small to large, including covers and reworks.

Emmanuel is a lifelong student of tattoocraft. From his youth submitting flash designs to tattoo magazines, to his early days building needles, tuning coil machines and doing whatever project walked through the door, through his first forays into dotwork and freehand, into the digital tattoo matrix of the 2020s, Emmanuel is committed to evolving with the craft and creating a safe, healthy, informed, and intentional space for transformation.

Books are open. If you would like to work together or find out more, please reach out!

Also available for commissions in other mediums.