Artists
Russell Bishop – Owner
I became interested in tattoos at the end of WW II when my uncles came home from the war with tattoos of Hula dancers on their arms and ships on their chests. When I went to school I would draw on my arms and the teachers would scold me for doing so. Around the age of 13 or so my brother came home from the Navy with tattoos. He said that if I would take a sewing needle and wrap it with thread and dip it in India ink and then poke it in my skin that it would make a tattoo. Viola!!! I began tattooing my friends.
In the “60’s” after I came home from the military I met a couple of bikers that were tattooing, after a bottle of whiskey they agreed to teach me to build my own tattoo machine and to learn tattooing. So after college and after several years in sales and owning my own marketing company I became disillusioned by it all, we had a cabin cruiser on Table Rock Lake and one day I met a young man covered in tattoos. We talked about his tattoos. He informed me that there was a tattoo convention in Kansas City and that I ought to attend, so I did. I was amazed and knew then what I wanted to do with the rest of my life. So in 1993 after a couple of years on the road tattooing, my wife and I started Skin Illustrations in Overland Park, Ks. And then a couple of years latter in Lawrence and then in Marathon, FL., Topeka, KS. and Chandler Arizona. As time went on the desire to retire was more important than all the studios so we closed all but the studios in O.P. and Lawrence.
We now have Skin Illustrations in O.P. and Lawrence, KS. In Lawrence we also have Hairdoos in the tattoo studio. My wife Jan is a licensed cosmetologist as well as a licensed body piercer. She is one of the best piercers in the industry. So that’s my story and I’m stick’n to it.
Lawrence, Kansas
Janis Bishop – Lawrence, KS
Always making sure the public is greeted with a friendly face and attitude, customer service and fair price has been my primary concern. 17 years of body piercing, excelled into Permanent Make-Up in 2000, then added to my professions the title of Cosmetologist in 2010.
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SeanSean was born in Norfolk Virginia in 1983. After a few years of active duty in the navy his father moved the family to central Kansas where his mother worked in an art gallery while his father practiced law. Drawing was often a source of entertainment in the small Kansas town where entertainment was sparse. After high school Sean attended gun-smithing school where he found that he enjoyed checkering and engraving more than the mechanics of the profession and began to focus more on art and design. After returning to his home town for a short time he decided central Kansas was not for him and moved to Lawrence KS. Once in Lawrence he began to develop the process for his torch burnings as well as his tattooing and after a few years was able to draw the attention of a few galleries in Chicago as well as California and Colorado. Apart from gallery shows Sean also works as a tattoo artist for Skin Illustrations in Lawrence KS and enjoys both mediums equally although his approach to both are quite different from each other.
TreyTrey was born in Arlington, Texas and grew up in both Wichita, Kansas and Elsinore, California. Trey is a professional tattoo artist as well as a local artist, known for his sketching, graffiti and spray paint artwork. Trey was very involved with Baseball and Football in school, however Trey’s passion has always been art and leaving his mark on the world. Moving to Elsinore from Wichita, Trey was exposed to a culture that embraced and glorified tattoo artwork. Being interested in art of all kinds, this is where Trey fell in love with the black and grey techniques commonly used in SoCal tattoos. A technique that he says still influences him today. “I love how B&G can be so hard but beautiful at the same time. I’ve been told my work looks ‘Latino’ or ‘Chicano’”. Trey’s lettering work is original and heavily influenced by his artistic styles and his experience with graffiti artwork. Through the experience of getting his own tattoos and experimenting on his own, Trey knew that he wanted to pursue tattooing as a career. Following that desire, Trey gained the opportunity to work for Skin Illustrations and apprenticed under Jan and Russell Bishop for a year. When not behind a tattoo machine, Trey spends his time drawing, painting, spray painting, watching Sports Center and taking care of his two dogs, Lexus and Luther.
Kaity – Hair Stylist
Grew up in Wellsville, Kansas, I guess you could say I started doing hair in my early high school years. My older brother would have me change his hair color almost every three weeks. Then that led to me dabbling with color in my own hair, having hot pink hair for choir concerts and marching band made me stand out. But it wasn’t until almost two years after high school, which I didn’t go off to college, that my best friend had a good idea that we go to cosmetology school together. As it turned out, it became second nature to me. I love doing interesting techniques for hair color to get different results and to make it your own instead of like everyone else. But what I personally take pride in, is my hair cutting skills.
I graduated hair school in 2008 and joined the industry in 2009, with Supercuts. I worked there for a year and a half, and doing almost 200 haircuts in two weeks time, all of them “to the T”. If you want a certain style, I’m your gal. And now that I’ve been in the industry for almost four years, I look forward to expanding my knowledge with everything Skin Illustrations is willing to teach me!
Overland Park, Kansas
Stef
Stef Ross is the newcomer at Skin Illustrations. After getting her first piercing at the age of 15, Stef was hooked on body modification. After making herself a nuisance at various tattoo shops for years, she found the opportunity to go through a Body Piercing apprenticeship under Jan of Skin Illustrations. Stef is the primary Body Piercer at the Lawrence location, having shown skill and natural talent for the art. An ex-Army trained EMT Basic – computer nerd – amateur graphic designer, Stef enjoys books, art, photography, technology, music and cultures of all kinds. Stef has a unique dedication to her clients, appreciating the fact that without them, all she’s doing is playing with shiny objects. Not making Body Art.
Lance TuckLance has been tattooing since 1987 around the Great Plains region. Hailing from far western Kansas, he began tattooing friends and family in his teenage years, progressing to work on the general public by 1990. After graduating from K State in 1994, Lance began his professional career in tattooing and body piercing. Among the first licensed practitioners in Kansas, Lance worked with the Skin Illustrations crew from 1995 to 2002. Lance remained active in the tattoo and piercing community in Lawrence, and has since returned to Skin Illustrations. You can find Lance working at the Overland Park location and continues to provide top notch customer service. If you want detail, if you like horror, sci-fi or comic book imagery, if you want fantasy art, come down and talk to Lance.
