“Everything will definitely come true.”

THIS IS OUR STORY

Hi, my name is Kate.
I am a designer and tattoo artist from Belarus. Now I live and work in Turkey, in Antalya. If you believe in a dream, it will definitely come true. I want to share my story.

Since childhood I loved to draw. I sketched illustrations from books, bought magazines with interiors, drew from there and came up with something new. I really wanted to go to study at an art school, but it was far from home. Therefore, I finished the school nearby with physical and mathematical bias. I chose a profession for myself easily and immediately. A big wish to practice tattoo emerged at the age of 14, when a new program “Miami Inc.” appeared on TV. It was my little dream, which I thought at that time would never come true. Tattoos wasn’t so popular in our country at that time. This program from America was so popular, I remember the girl Kat Von D also participated there. She became my real idol for tattooing. Bright, beautiful, and a tattoo artist. Since then, I imagined that one day I will be like her. Without missing a single episode, I watched how they draw sketches, communicated with people and tattooed.
I bought a book with tattoo sketches and with a history of tattooing, took an ordinary pen and started to draw tattoos from this book to all my friends. I studied all the sketches to the holes on the pages.

Studying as an artist in the class with physical and mathematical bias was very difficult, so, after the 9th grade I was looking forward to leaving the school and to start working as a designer. But I had to go through a difficult path again. My family didn’t t really support me when they found out about my wish of becoming a designer. At that time the profession wasn’t very popular. They said that I would be poor and that I wouldn’t be able to earn anything by painting pictures. But I believed that I would succeed. I didn’t have a professional drawing, only beginner`s sketches, so after school I went to college courses for a whole year and studied academic drawing. Realizing that I don’t have big chances, since everyone who entered earlier, studied drawing from the 1st grade, for a year I learned all the basics of drawing and painting but didn’t enter the college. Straight away I entered another one and this is something I have no regrets about. Now the dream was much closer, while studying and drawing, I imagined what kind of designer I would become and still believed that someday I would take a tattoo machine and start tattooing. The dream seemed so close yet so far. There wasn’t enough money to buy a tattoo machine, and I planned to work and to save for my first tattoo machine. That happened like that, but not right away, of course. For many years I worked as a designer and when I was finally sure that I could start tattooing, I drew a sketch for myself and asked a friend who is making tattoos to teach me while making a tattoo for me using my own sketch. Later he gave me a machine, I started trying make tattoos. Firstly, on pigskin, then practicing with my friends. For a long time, tattooing remained just as a hobby. I had to work hard and wait for a more favorable time. I wanted to quit my job and to open my own salon. But everything that is not done in life is for the better. Faith is the key. When people believe in you and you believe in yourself, you can do everything. Even move mountains.

After 10 years of work, I achieved my awaited goal. At the age of 30, living and working in another country, with the help of my husband and friends, I opened my first salon and I have a graphic design firm. And I definitely believe that we will succeed. A dream and your belief in yourself are the most important thing in life. Many years may pass. But everything will definitely come true.