This episode’s guest is an artist, tattoo artist, and owner of a tattoo shop in Nashville TN, Adventure Tattoo. Chad grew up in the Midwest of the United States, He left school and home as a teenager and started to make his way out in the world pretty young. My conversation with him was really great and he shared some lessons he has learned along the way that I think we can all learn from.
Experience 090 Artist Chad Koeplinger on:
Additional Information:
Animal Songs Book: https://lllbooks.com
Collaborative art show November 7th at @artattacksf
March 2022 Solo show at: @rakinglightprojectsgallery
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Transcript
Ricky McEachern (00:03):
This episode's guest is an artsist, a tattoo artist, and owner of a tattoo shop in Nashville, Tennessee, adventure tattoo. Chad grew up in the Midwest of the United States. He left school and home as a teenager and started to make his way out in the world. Pretty young. My conversation with him was really great and he shared some lessons he has learned along the way that I think we all can learn from. I am pleased to share my conversation with Chad coupling our,
Chad Koeplinger (01:00):
I never really liked school, even as a little kid, you know, I mean most people, I suppose don't, but I really hated I was just like, school'sgonna be benefited by the high school academia. You know what I mean? Always been a relatively independent minded person. I remember kindergarten when we were getting dropped off, you know, all the kids are getting dropped off for the first day at kindergarten and there's all these kids crying and they're upset. And I remember like being like, why are they crying? It didn't even occur to me to be sad that I was leaving my parents.
Chad Koeplinger (01:53):
I love my parents don't get me wrong, but that, and like I think skateboarding and, and being out, especially as the way it was back then punk stuff, et cetera, kind of prepared you for that sort of being independent all my early memories. Like I, I don't remember a time in my life where I didn't love art and, and, and, you know, tried to make art. I wasn't very good at making art as a kid, but I tried really hard, you know, of course I loved comic books and you know, somehow yeah. Paintings and things like that always kind of were something that I was just like, man, you know, I always felt this attraction to art in any way, shape or form, you know, since I was a young kid and even down to my parents would sometimes just drop me off at the main library in Saginaw as a babysitter, and then pick me up after work, you know, like I'd go there after school and that's just where I'd hang out.
Chad Koeplinger (02:57):
And I would, I would spend all the time in the art section looking at like Francis bacon books at like nine years old. You know, I remember being six years old with my dad in a McDonald's and I remember waiting in line and there was this guy in line that in my, my memory had a full body city. It was just covered in tattoos. And I remember he had all these muscles and veins and popping out in these tattoos and it just looks so cool on him. And I remember like asking my parents about it and there they're like, oh, those are tattoos. You know, they're needles that it hurts. Your you'll never get one, you know? And I was just like, no, I'm going to be covered in these things. Thrasher magazine had the January, 1990 issue had like a big tattoo article, like a huge thing on tattooing was in that magazine and reading through that and looking at all those tattoos, I was like, this is it, man.
Chad Koeplinger (03:51):
This is for me. And then this dude that lived down the street, who ended up teaching me to tattoo later in life, he had some tattoos and then he started doing them. And, and then another friend of mine, like when he was 15, his dad set it up for him to get tattooed in his kitchen, by his biker friend. And like, it just, it was just, was always there, you know, and then like getting into like hardcore and punk music. Like a lot of those guys were tattooed. It just seemed like it was always there. It was like this little thing, you know, whispering in my ear every direction of anything else that I found interested in correlated with tattoos, all my friends, you know, we, we were lucky or maybe, I don't know if lucky is the right word, but the guy that ended up teaching me with tattoo, all of us, even though we were under age, I think he knew that we would have just done handbooks on each other and really things up.
Chad Koeplinger (04:42):
So he, he, you know, he, he tried to help us out that way. And you know, so all of us were getting tattooed all the time. And I had a period after he opened that shop, that I was in the tattoo shop almost every day, at some point, whether it was hanging out all day or just stopping by or whatever. And I always wanted to do it, but I had so much respect and admiration for this, my teacher, Dwayne, that I didn't want to like ask him to teach me. I didn't want to be like, Hey man I want to do what you do. So I was in my head, I was waiting for him to ask to tell me I should be a tattoo or something. Never since I was a really little kid, I never had any interest in doing or liking or caring what anybody else was doing or, you know, I just, if I liked it, I liked it.
Chad Koeplinger (05:28):
But I, I never was like, oh, I have to like anything because my peers do or do anything the way anybody else did it. And when tattooing as a possibility camera around it, I wanted to do it. Right. Because tattooing has kind of a long tradition, you know, of a way of doing things. So I didn't want to like as a young person, I was, so I felt so lucky to become part of tattooing or have tattoo and be in my life that I would've done whatever it took, you know, like, you know, and I, I did make some weird compromises here and there, but like I never did that before because, you know, I just didn't, you know, it never made sense to, but with tattooing, it was like, I felt so lucky to be part of that, that I would, yeah, I would have done whatever. And that that's, you know, that's really it.
Ricky McEachern (06:23):
I wonder what would have happened to you if you didn't discover tattooing?
Chad Koeplinger (06:28):
Oh man, I probably would've just, I mean, you know, up, who knows, you know, I'd probably just be working at some job, you know, barely making it, you know, I probably would have had a lot of fun somehow
Ricky McEachern (06:43):
To me, this is like a lesson for people listening, because it's almost like keep trying until you find the right thing for you.
Chad Koeplinger (06:53):
Jobs that I did prior to that, I, as much as I may have hated them or whatever, I still tried to always just do the best I could, but I always, I never really did it the way I was supposed to do it. Probably, you know, I I never wanted to, I never didn't give anything my, all my all wasn't always great, but I, even if I hated it, I, I think I was always just like, I got to do this for survival. You know what I mean? And I think that in a way that transferring into tattooing for me as much as like you said, was totally applicable, there was also that foundation I had of always like, kind of, I needed to, to make things work for me somehow. You know what I mean, whatever level that may be, maybe my, my bar was only, you know, two inches off the ground, but I, I still needed to survive.
Chad Koeplinger (07:52):
Right. So that feeling of like, I have to make this work no matter what, you know, we'll finally was able to transfer into something I actually cared about. You know what I mean? And that's, that's like a thing that I think a lot of people never get, man. I think that's the thing that is, is partially luck, but also partially searching who you are inside as a person. And then also you know, being relentless and being willing to sacrifice and you know, like understanding that maybe the way that you want it to go, this took me a while to figure out, but maybe the way I want it to go, isn't always the way that it's going to make something work. That's going to be better for me and make me happier in the long picture, you know, like you have to put in the work.
Chad Koeplinger (08:51):
Right. And you know, that was the thing with tattooing. Like I got my opportunity with my teacher, but it wasn't busy there. And I left after a few months and I moved in, I lived in a attic in a shop in Ohio working for like a wild biker dude, because that was the opportunity I had. And then that didn't work out. And then I ended up moving down to Alabama and all this was just in a few months, you know, and like moving back and forth and whatever to wherever the opportunity was not being with my homies and not, you know, doing all the things that I was previously in love with, you know, being around people I cared about, you know, it's like, what do you want out of life, man? Do you want, do you want the goal? Do you want the, the big picture, the thing that you're passionate over?
Chad Koeplinger (09:39):
Well, you're not always going to get it how you want it. You know, you have to work there and then you can make it into what you want. But you know, often there's a lot of you have to eat. My friend used to tell me that if you eat enough poop eventually, or no, if you eat enough, eventually you poop out a diamonds and it's true, you know? And I think a lot of people aren't willing to do that. I mean, that, that means a lot of people are just stuck in mediocrity all the time.
Ricky McEachern (10:07):
And I think what this gets to is something that comes up on this podcast all the time is people it's kind of like fear of failure, because what you're saying is like fail often, like keep trying fail and keep going. And a lot of people are afraid of doing that. And that's kind of what you're saying. You've got to just, at some point you gotta plan and at some point you just gotta do it and then just see what happens and, and assess, pull your ego out of it. Assess what worked, assess what didn't work. And then try again.
Chad Koeplinger (10:38):
I've never been afraid of failing. I mean, that's one thing with, like, I think I can bring that back to skateboarding. It's like, you don't just get on a skateboard and do everything perfectly. You fall and you get really hurt and, and you, you face your fears. Right. And that's the thing with, I hate hearing this. Like, people are like, oh, well I tried that once, but I wasn't good at it. So I stopped and it's like, well, why, why do you have to be good at something? Like, why can't you learn to be good at something? You know, I don't really understand that. You know, it it's never, I don't know. It just doesn't make sense to me. You know? Like if you like it, you should continue. Why, why would not being good at it mean that you don't like, you know, I mean, like, honestly, I'll be, be real with you.
Chad Koeplinger (11:23):
I don't think I learned to draw well until I'd been tattooing for like four or five years or not even, well, I wouldn't even say, I would say with intention, like a lot of times, if something good happened, it was an accident. You know, I didn't have any like actual idea of where the I was going until that deep into it. But I see like a lot of people now, younger people like they, oh, I tried that for awhile. You know, whatever. It's like, cool, man. Like hopefully there's something they'll figure out in their life, but I don't know. You know,
Ricky McEachern (11:56):
One of the reasons I wanted to get a tattoo artist onto the podcast, because there's something about the art of tattooing that is, seems very unique to me. And I'm an oil painter, so I make paintings and then I sell them and they sit in someone's house. Right. You have to have a sense of trust and relationship because it's, you're permanently inking someone's body. So that is a, that is an aspect to your artistry that most other artists don't have an actor, a photographer, a writer. Can you tell me about that?
Chad Koeplinger (12:35):
Well, yeah. I mean, it's it's very intimate and it's very I mean, you know, it's as permanent as a human body could be, you know, we're not truly permanent, but yeah. I mean, it's, it's a, it's a strange thing. And it's multifaceted. I mean, a lot of people that get tattoos, you know, they get them for so many different reasons. And, you know, as the person that's doing the tattoos, you kind of have to be able to bend yourself to that a little bit and not only give them the best product that you can give them. Hopefully you're able to, to do some creative work in your time as a tattooer. Some people don't, some people just strictly do what people ask, you know, all day long and, and the way they ask some sometimes, you know, like I said, there's a million ways of doing it. People can ask for things and you can put your own twist on it. And then, but there's also times where you just do it the way it is. And the majority of being a tattooer is being a craftsperson more so than an artist.
Ricky McEachern (13:41):
I want to talk about your 50 states and the book that you did. Can you tell me about that? And I want to know, so what, first of all, can you just describe what you did?
Chad Koeplinger (13:52):
Yeah. in 2016 I did a 50 states tour. I'd always wanted to tattoo in all 50 states and travel to them even when I was young. I always thought it'd be kind of cool as far as I know, nobody had ever tattooed in all 50 before. And you know, I, I was going through a period of my life where I didn't live anywhere. I really, you know, my, my, the girl I was dating at the time and I, we broke up, we were in Bali and we got in a fight and we broke up and we were stuck there for a month with each other.
Ricky McEachern (14:30):
You broke up in Bali. Yeah.
Chad Koeplinger (14:35):
Uber. Yeah. It was a fight about
Ricky McEachern (14:38):
It's very dry. That's very dramatic. So when we do, when we do the movie about your life, that is definitely going to be a scene out of the breakup.
Chad Koeplinger (14:47):
It was insane. She's still a good friend of mine. It's cool. But like, during that time I was thinking, well, what the hell am I going to do with my year? I don't know where to live. I don't have anything going on. And I was like, well, now's the time to do this 50 states to, or it. You know? So I'm in Bali and I'm making a list and looking at a map and trying to figure out the routing and all that. And I, you know, it worked out really good. I, you know, so I was like, well, I got nothing but time. So I went for it and it ended up being all 50 states in 97 days.
Ricky McEachern (15:24):
Now, I know you did a book. I looked like that was sold out. Is there, can you still get that books that you put together?
Chad Koeplinger (15:32):
No. It's, as far as I know, it's sold out everywhere that it was available, but we are talking about doing an ebook on it. And hopefully if we do that, it should be available in the next a little bit. But yeah, it's it's it's yeah, it was, it was a pretty nuts thing, man. What, like one day, one day I'm tattooing for 10 hours in a shop and then I'm driving and I'm tattooing the next day in another state, you know?
Ricky McEachern (16:01):
I mean, is there anything that you learned from that, like at the end of going to all 50 states and tattooing people, like, did that change you in any way?
Chad Koeplinger (16:11):
Yeah, definitely. I, so what it taught me a it's really good to stick to what you said you're going to do and make it happen no matter what, but also be always have a backup plan because I didn't, and, you know, I could have gotten really screwed if I, you know, so always have a backup plan. I also realized that, you know, America's a very beautiful country. I spent so much time traveling all over the world instead of here. And honestly, like, it's, it's gorgeous. People are like, oh, this stretch of highway sucks or this. And I'm like, nah, I don't agree. I think it's really, really beautiful. It was like a meditation a lot of times, but yeah, just spending all that time alone, I was alone the whole time. I didn't have anybody with me. I wasn't doing it with anyone else. You learn a lot by just being by yourself and sorting things out in your head, you know? And it, that's what led me to feel like I needed to completely settle down and actually commit to settling down here in Nashville.
Ricky McEachern (17:09):
You know, the, the actress Joan Crawford. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. She went to Hollywood when she was 19, she went to school until sixth grade or something. So she became this super, super successful person. And she said, basically I was raised by Hollywood and movie sets. So that's how I learned everything. I know I didn't go to school and I was kinda thinking of you that way, coming into this, that you, you left home young, but at some point you have become a responsible man where you're running a business. You have people that work for you. You're also managing, you have relationships with creative people and I'm, how did you learn that? And it sounds like it was the tattoo community. It seemed like it, that actually taught you that.
Chad Koeplinger (17:57):
Absolutely. I mean, you know, some of it was from skateboarding and punk rock for sure. But the majority of any of the, the real good stuff was through the tattoo world. Sometimes not always from like savory characters either, you know, but people that were telling you things about, you know, business stuff that you can really translate into life, you know, just things about following through things about the way you treat people and, and, and this kind of thing. And yeah, that was all definitely tattoo world stuff. A lot of it, I had to learn through thinking of it metaphorically or interpreting it in my own way. You know what I mean? A lot of them, a lot of those lessons, weren't always direct lessons, but they were still really valuable nonetheless, and definitely made me whoever I am today. For sure.
Ricky McEachern (18:43):
Tell me about what's next for you. What do you have coming up?
Chad Koeplinger (18:47):
Okay. well, the first thing is I have a new book coming out called animal songs and animal songs is a book where I was kinda thinking to myself, man, when I'm drawing stuff, I tend to make the noise of the thing that I'm drawing or in my head, whatever, just some tick maybe. And I I basically drew 50 animal heads with no reference just out of my head. Some of them are pretty accurate. Some of them aren't just as fast as I could. I gave myself, you know, maybe one to two minutes each drawing and then I painted them. And so there's a book of 50 animal heads. And then there's a record of that's coming a company of all the sounds of all 50 animals. And I made that just out of my head as well. I don't, you know, some like just kind of going for it and it's all my mouth and a couple of little accoutrements with it.
Chad Koeplinger (19:45):
And that that'll be out pretty much any day now, sometime in the next few weeks also I have a show with my friend, Steve Byrne. We are a, we did a bunch of collaborative paintings last year, right before the pandemic. And then also this spring, we, we reunited and did a bunch more and we're showing those that attack gallery in San Francisco on November 6th. And that's going to be a pretty cool show. We have a ton of kind of strange abstract things that we did with like Sumi and pastel cells. And then some acrylic paint, kind of a whole mixed media kind of wild thing. And then I'm having a, a solo show in LA at the raking light projects gallery in March the first weekend of March. I'm not sure of the exact date yet. And that should be interesting. I I'm working on all those paintings now. So come see them and buy them. Yes,
Ricky McEachern (20:45):
I will put all the information about in the show notes. All right, Chad Caplinger, this was way better than I hoped for. So thank you so much. My name is Ricky Miguel, and you have been listening to eager to know the podcast. If you haven't already, please go to apple podcasts and subscribe rate and review this podcast. Join me next week for another eager to know podcast.