ABOUT V
Artist. Tattooist. Forever curious about why people create, what they choose to surround themselves with, and the the stories they carry with them.
This is the story of how two careers in one studio came to life — and why this moment feels like the beginning.
There has never been a time in my life when I wasn’t creating, adapting, fixing or improving something!
LEARNING HOW TO LEARN
Like many children, I spent my early years drawing, painting and making things, but it wasn’t until secondary school in Spain that I realised creativity wasn’t just something to feel—it was something that could be understood.
In my first year of GCSE Art I struggled. I couldn’t understand how to turn the freedom of childhood creativity into a qualification. During the summer holidays I realised I had been approaching the subject entirely the wrong way. I reworked almost every piece from the previous year and, instead of treating art as something separate from the rest of my education, I approached it in exactly the same way I approached science.
From that moment everything changed.
I stopped trying to produce artwork that looked right and started analysing how and why it worked. My teacher encouraged me to continue beyond the classroom with private art and sculpture lessons, and at the end of the course I became the first student at my international college in southern Spain to achieve an A* in GCSE Art.
It wasn’t the grade that mattered.
It was the realisation that creativity had a process and that by understanding that process, almost anything could be achieved.
“That was the first time I realised creativity could be understood as well as felt”
LEARNING THE HOW
When I returned to the UK I surprised a lot of people by choosing not to study Art at A-level. Instead I studied Human Biology, Chemistry and Psychology while working full-time. To many people those subjects seem worlds apart, but to me they never were. Science taught me to observe, analyse and question. Art gave me somewhere to apply those skills.
I’ve always been fascinated by process. Whenever I see a painting, a sculpture or a beautifully crafted object, my first instinct isn’t simply to admire it. It’s to understand it.
How was it made?
Why did the artist choose that approach?
What decisions happened before the finished piece existed?
If I can understand the process, I can learn from it. That curiosity has shaped every stage of my creative life — including in my property developing!
ART MEETS REALITY
After beginning a degree in Biomedical Science at the University of Brighton, I realised that although I loved learning, my future belonged in art.
At nineteen I became the youngest represented artist at Synergy Gallery in Hove. My work appeared in local newspapers and Sussex Life, and I began organising exhibitions in unusual spaces, bringing groups of artists together in converted warehouses and industrial buildings while hosting exhibitions and art auctions.
For a while it felt like the beginning of the career I had imagined. Then reality arrived.
I wanted to buy my first property and renovate it, but at the time banks had little confidence in lending to a self-employed artist. I realised I needed to find another way of supporting the life I wanted to build.
I worked for Bupa International for two years, while I bought my first renovation project, before founding Riot Creative Ltd, a web and graphic design agency.
“Creativity never left. It simply changed careers.”
FINDING TATTOOING
Everything changed when I had my first tattoo from Lyn Akura in Brighton.
Growing up, I’d often been told that art wouldn’t pay the bills. Seeing a successful female tattoo artist working confidently within what was still a predominantly male industry challenged that belief. For the first time I could see a career that combined creativity with craftsmanship.
I began learning to tattoo in 2009 while continuing to run my design agency, before co-founding Inkfectious in Portslade in 2010. Later I opened Inkquisitive in Worthing, where I spent the next decade building both the studio and my career.
Tattooing became another language to learn. Every time I mastered one style, I became fascinated by the next.
Neo-Traditional — Blackwork — Ornamental — Realism — Japanese — Fine Line — Cover-Ups & Re-Works.
Every style had its own logic, its own history and its own way of solving creative problems. For me, learning has always been just as rewarding as creating. The challenge wasn’t simply producing good work — It was understanding how the style could be manipulated into the next.
THE RETREAT
After running commercial studios for many years, mentoring apprentices and helping hundreds of people tell their stories through tattoos, I found myself wanting something quieter. I sold my house in Worthing, moved to North Sompting and converted the detached garage into my own private studio.
I called it The Retreat.
The name carries two meanings. It is my personal creative retreat, but it also represents my retreat from the pace and pressure of commercial tattooing.
For the first time in many years I had the space to think differently.
“Many people have their midlife crisis through cars or holidays — Mine is through art. ”
WHAT DO I WANT ON MY OWN WALLS
After seventeen years designing artwork around other people’s ideas, something unexpected happened.
I realised I could create almost anything. I could work in almost any style. I could analyse almost any process. But there was one question I couldn’t answer.
What do I actually like?
When you spend your life learning every possible creative language, settling on a single visual identity becomes surprisingly difficult. In a field of endless possibilities, how do you decide which direction is truly yours?
That question now sits at the centre of everything I paint. My oil paintings are not created because I think they’ll sell.
They begin with a much simpler question.
What do I want on my own walls?
Each collection grows from that idea.
Alongside them are my studies and experiments — smaller explorations where I allow myself to test new processes, materials and ideas. Sometimes the creativity simply needs somewhere to go before it becomes part of a larger body of work.
TODAY
Today my two careers exist in one studio.
One career creates deeply personal tattoos. The other explores the paintings I want to exist in the world.
Tattooing remains an important part of who I am and I have no intention of leaving it behind. It has given me an incredible career, introduced me to remarkable people and taught me lessons that continue to shape every painting I create.
My goal isn’t to replace one with the other. It’s to give them equal space.
Because after a lifetime spent learning how other artists work, I’m finally allowing myself to discover what my own work wants to become.
“AFTER SEVENTEEN YEARS CREATING OTHER PEOPLE’S VISIONS, I REALISED I NO LONGER KNEW WHAT I WANTED ON MY OWN WALLS.”
That search continues…