VMAN ONLINE EXCLUSIVE

THIS IS NOT HERE

We hit L.A. for a survey of cool guys who capture the new essence of Lost Angeles

Photography Colin Donahue      Styling Parinaz Mogadassi Contributing art editor Dominic Sidhu

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Mark Mahoney, "Tattooer," 52, photographed on Sunset Blvd. in the back of his 1988 Avanti

Jacket Prada
Tank GAP

On the sunset strip:
I love L.A., it's the cars and the motorcycles, the sunshine, the blue water, watching the world go by. Everyone comes to L.A. sooner or later so if you just stay on the Sunset Strip for long enough you can meet the whole world eventually. I dig that.

On nights at the Shamrock Social Club:
My favorite nights at Shamrock where I Tattoo are when I work on someone from column A and from column B. Tattooing my old buddies from east L.A. or someone from 90210, Johnny Depp, Brad and Angelina and my biker buddies all in one night. Gordo from east L.A. is one of my best homeys to work on. Shamrock Social Club is where the elite and the underworld meet. It's about the L.A. contrast, that's what I dig."

Art History 101
I started tattooing in Boston back in the 1976 when it was still illegal. Nan [Goldin] took some of my favorite pics when I was starting out. She was one of the homeys, shooting me constant, she used to hang out with my greaser homeboys before we even had a shop. We would just hang out all the time drinkin' tattooin'. We all moved to New York eventually and at our first loft the guy who used to live there abandoned his pet monkey, so we took care of him and named him Joseph. He didn't like anyone much except for me and Nan. Once we went to visit Nan's mom in Swampscott and the monkey got lost in her backyard, we all were so worried and kept calling out to him, but then Nan found him up in this tree and saved him.