Martin Rangel
Being a native of North Dallas, the city of Addison is a part of town I pass through quite often. It’s a part of the DFW metroplex region that is known for its abundance of restaurants and nightlife. On Beltline rd going west, passing the Preston/289 intersection, you will be greeted with Addison’s finest wine and dine spots. The various bars, hangout spots, Improv Comedy Club and the luxurious Galleria mall are just a few of the main attractions in the area. As lively and well populated as it is, with much to do and much to offer, its not really my scene. Nevertheless, with its eye catching, luminous city lights and upbeat energy, Addison is perfect for a lovely date night.
Today, on this painfully hot summer day, I’m in Addison for a legitimate reason. I’m here to meet up with the young tattoo artist Martin Rangel. As a self proclaimed tattoo collector, I’m always searching for a new artist and coincidentally being involved in the local music scene, it was imperative that I was going to cross paths with Martin. I found him on Twitter, he wasn’t hard considering our mutual friends retweeting his artwork enough to fill my time line. It was difficult not to notice his art unless i logged off completely. What grabbed my attention was his style of work. When I asked him to describe his style, he described it as “ dark/traditional based on traditional principles. Intrigued by his answer, I noticed his love for blackwork. It was pleasing to me, since my skin complexion is of a darker tone.
I had the pleasure of meeting Martin at Iron Dagger Tattoo shop, owned by fellow tattoo artist Taylor Moran. The baby blue Victorian house turned tattoo shop is nestled in the corner of Broadway St and Addison Road, surrounded by other small businesses that I paid little attention to. As I walked inside, i was met with traditional tattoo art on a dark wall adjacent to a wooden staircase, a nonchalant employee asking me who I am here to see and a very young couple sitting on a leather couch. A door that was opening from the right caught my eye and Martin poked his head. He was at the beginning of a tattoo appointment, freehanding a filler on a previous tattoo he did.
Smokepurrp and his heavy usage on 808’s was slapping against the speakers as I entered the room and I felt compelled to headbang as the hit song Audi continued to play. Martin is associated with a few artist in the DFW underground rap scene. Recently tattooing artists such as Emotional Xan and Tay Money, his love for the music is as genuine as any other participant of the culture. He revisits a recent memory of himself reaching backstage at the last Thouxanband Fauni show, “ When i got back there [backstage], I met Go Yayo, and we just chilled and talked about being from Ft Worth” A tiny sparkle flashed over his right eye as he mentions his hometown of Ft Worth, or “Murda Worth, depending on who you ask.
His client was a woman, probably in her early 20’s, pale skin that contained some of Martin’s previous work and with very short neon, yellow hair. After a brief introduction, I found out that she was a make-up artist. As I was fixing the camera setting in my Nikon camera, Martin agreed to lay some of his recent artwork on the table towards the back in of the suite. As I was snapping photos on his work, I noticed Rangel’s composure as he was tattooing, he seemed to be pretty effortless as if he’s drawing on paper. Light-handed and able to knock out an average size tattoo in no time (no exaggeration needed), Martin has been as artist since middle school. Decent at the time, it wasn’t until he started tattooing is when he started taking his skills seriously. A lot of his inspiration comes from tattoo artists Maria Sena, Jon Harding, Bryce Dallas, Jay Joree and Danni G. Working 7 days a week , its a mystery to me on how he is able to maintain a nightlife, with frequent visits to Deep Ellum
Weeks went by and I made the decision to get a tattoo from Martin. It was sitting on my mind for a while because I had several ideas to choose from. At first, I wanted to fill the chunk of unmarked territory on the right side of my neck with a butterfly or a rose with a traditional bird. My mind changed and I figured it would be best to cover up an tattoo I got in my teenage years on my left calf. Ultimately, I made the decision to get a dagger with the word “TUFF LUCK” across the lower portion of the dagger. Martin accompanied the comfortable feeling of coming back home from a long journey as I laid on the massage table. The sound of the tattoo gun was soothing to the ear as he began the session and before long I found myself standing in front of the mirror and admiring his work on my inner right arm. It was at the moment that Martin had become my new favorite tattoo artist.
