Introducing Tattoo Artist, Ali / Nuru Moon Ink, who specialises in Traditional Handpoke Tattoos. We get to know her story of becoming an artist, what drives her passion, her style of work, and more in our exclusive interview below.
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Full name: Ali / Nuru Moon Ink
Shop: Aya Soul Tattoos
Years tattooing: 4 years
Tattoo style: Traditional Handpoke Tattoo
Hourly rate: I charge per piece not per hour
Give us some insight into your journey of becoming a tattoo artist?
It’s quite a story. In 2018 I decided to go to France for a few months and before leaving I started speaking to a traditional artist called Inkah Wildscribe who agreed to start mentoring me when I got there. When I arrived I started learning from him, he is an unbelievably talented artist, but I felt like my journey needed to take me elsewhere. I met a French tattoo artist called Max Native and went to stay with him for a few weeks helping him build his new tattoo studio. He became a dear friend and he helped guide me in the right direction. Through him I was contacted by a traditional Filipino artist from Los Angeles named Elle Festin who I had seen before on an episode dedicated to tattooing on a Netflix documentary called Explained. He loved my art and asked to be my mentor. I learned so much from him. He definitely helped me find my own style within my tattooing. He encouraged me to learn about different African tribes, their symbolism, their beadwork and pottery, the way they painted their huts, etc, which I still use as inspiration in my work. In April of 2019 he flew me out to meet him in New Zealand where I did my first tattoo convention. It was called Ngā Uri o Murturangi – Maori and Indigenous Space Tattoo Extravaganza. For the week before the convention we were hosted in a wharenui (“long house”) which is a communal house of the Mãori people on a marae (a sacred communal land for gatherings). Before walking onto the land we had to be welcomed with their traditional Powhiri ceremony consisting of the most beautiful singing, a warrior dance and greeting each person with a hongi (this involves two people pressing their noses and foreheads together, holding each other’s heads, and breathing in simultaneously to share the same moment and breath). Together we shared the space with different Polynesian tribes. Tahitians, Taiwanese, Native Americans, Hawaiians, Filipinos and French Polynesians and obviously the Maori. Every night a different tribe would host the evening by cooking their food, sharing in their singing and dancing and doing workshops on their form of traditional tattooing such as hand tapping, skin stitching, etc. At night we all slept next to each other on mattresses on the floor in the long house. I met the most incredible and inspiring people that I will consider family forever. This was the single most magical and humbling experience of my life and it’s something that will stay with me for the rest of my life.
After this I flew to California and did a guest spot at Triton Tattoo in Santa Cruz for a few weeks, which I’m dying to go back to at some point. Then in 2020 I opened up my own little studio in Woodstock, Cape Town, along with my business partner, Sean Pingils. We opened our doors two weeks before they announced lockdown. So it was a tough year but we saved her and I honestly couldn’t be happier in our space.
What first attracted you to the trade?
I’ve just always been fascinated by tattoos but every time I walked into a tattoo shop in Cape Town there was just something that didn’t quite resonate with me personally, and then after going to Europe and exploring the world of traditional tattooing it just felt better suited to me. I fell in love with it.
Tell us something most people don’t know about you?
I have a secret desire to be a ninja. I’m currently learning nunchaku and katana because it gives me the thrill of what I imagine being a badass ninja would be like.
When not tattooing, what do you like to do with your downtime?
I’m also a dancer so when I’m not tattooing or drawing I’m in dance classes. I do pole dancing, sensual floorplay and aerial hoop. When I’m not drawing, tattooing or dancing I’m usually learning nunchaku and katana. And, when I’m not doing something creative or active, I’m usually chilling with my dog.
What is one of the wildest experiences you’ve ever experienced?
Where do I start. Anyone who knows me will tell you that my entire life is one wild experience after the next. But probably my trip to New Zealand.
What style of tattoo do you enjoy creating the most?
I do a lot of tribal tattoos. I study different tribes, symbology, patterns, etc, and try to use it as accurately and respectfully as I can. I do some ornamental designs too and occasionally switch it up with more realistic type tattoos. As realistic as I can do with handpoke.
I love to push the limits of what people can achieve with handpoke and I love to create quite large pieces. Every single piece I tattoo is my own artwork and unique to the person I am creating the tattoo for.
Besides the obvious, what are the main differences between handpoke tattooing and machine tattooing?
I can only speak from my own personal experience and opinion, but the energy is just different with the different forms of traditional tattooing as opposed to machine. It feels a lot more intimate and almost ritualistic/ ceremonial. That’s the part of it that really made me fall in love with it.
Does it hurt more or less than machine? Pain is all relative and subjective to an individual. Machine and handpoking are two very different feelings and different kinds of pain, some people hate the feeling of handpoking, some people love it and fall asleep. So it all depends on the individual and where on the body they are being tattooed, etc.
Do they last as long as machine tattoos? When done correctly they will last forever.
The healing is also a little different to machine. It’s a lot more gentle on the skin so heals pretty quickly and I personally feel that it’s not as sore the next few days after getting tattooed.
Why is handpoking your chosen form?
I just don’t feel the same connection when using machine. I love tattooing, in all forms. For me personally, I just feel more connected to handpoke.
If you could tattoo anyone one person, who would it be and why?
My parents. Especially my dad. Just because he’s from a small Portuguese island so he’s very traditional and set in his ways, and in my mind having a tattoo might change his views on it. Also I think it would be really special.
Where would you like to see your tattoo career take you?
I would love to do some more traveling and guest spots overseas. There are also a few traditional tattoo conventions that I have been asked to join, which I would love to attend as soon as I’m able to.
For anyone wanting to book and appointment with you, what’s the next step?
They can contact me on my Nuru Moon Ink Instagram Page or email me and we can discuss what they would like, what style, what they’d like it to represent etc and go from there.
Aya Soul Tattoos
Email: ayasoultattoos@gmail.com
Address: 222 Sir Lowry Road, Woodstock, Cape Town
Facebook Page | Instagram
Tattoos by Ali
Photos by Grant McLachlan.