Kike Castillo

Kike Castillo was born and raised in Colombia. At a very young age, he had a huge interest in art. The growth of his artistic abilities grew into an interest in tattooing. He started off gaining most of his influence from his sister, Monica Henk (1980- 2007) who was also a tattoo artist. At the age of 12 helped Monica tattoo herself on her hand. At 15, before even holding a tattoo machine, he got his first tattoo by a friend. Two years later, Kike moved to New York. He found that the people of NYC were more expressive, and a lot more open to tattoos. At 17, he got a job right away as a bike messanger, without knowing a word of english. Kike found himself working as a bike messanger in the morning, going to english school in the evening, and tattooing his friends at night. After learning the english language, Kike took art classes at SVA, New School and The Students Leauge of Art. With his art education, tattooing friends, and gaining tips and influence from professional tattooers, Kike landed his first tattooing job at a street shop in NYC. He worked at a few different NYC shops, until he found a shop he was proud of, Timmy Tattoo in Huntington, NY. After working at Timmy Tattoo for 2 years, he moved to Baltimore, Maryland. He currently is working at Pinz n Needlez 5 days a week from 11-9. You can also find Kike, year round, at various different tattoo conventions throughout the United States, and guest spotting at Timmy Tattoo.