Tattoo artist inks 6-year-old’s design on himself after boy wins shop contest
By Donald Fountain
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ATLANTA (WUPA) — Inside the Iron Palm Tattoo Studio, artist Marlon Blake says he lives by one simple rule: “Wake up every day and do exactly what you love to do.”
For Blake, that’s been true for the past 12 years.
“I literally get the opportunity to wake up, come to work, draw on people,” he said.
When he inks his passion onto others, he says the work never feels like work.
“That’s when the job becomes less of a job and more just fun.”
Blake has seen countless designs come across his station, but these were different.
“It absolutely blew me away,” he said.
The drawings appeared simple for an experienced artist. Especially coming from someone like Sage Williams.
“I’m only like 6 years old. I’m only still a kid,” Sage said.
“Yeah! He’s only 6 years old,” Blake added.
Blake discovered Sage through his annual tattoo drawing competition, where the winner’s design gets used in the shop. Sage was the clear standout.
“What he submitted was like, okay, this can’t be real,” Blake said.
Sage has a passion for painting, and one of his pieces now hangs proudly in the studio.
“I worked very hard for this,” Sage said. “You just have to practice a lot.”
His dad helps guide him, but Sage insists he brings something special.
“I’m just very intelligent,” he said.
The two artists share more similarities than expected.
“Around that age is when I realized that I had the talent as an artist,” Blake said. “Seeing that in that kid, I would like to be a part of his life.”
Or maybe, Blake admitted, it’s the other way around.
No one used Sage’s winning design, so Blake made the artwork a permanent part of his own life, tattooing it onto himself.
“This is me begging you, Sage, to take your art serious, follow through with it, don’t look nowhere else,” Blake told him.
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