Hi, I'm Benjamin Laukis.
I'm from Australia, but I live in Greece.
Welcome to the London Tattoo Convention.
The London show is the best in the world.
It's the highest level of tattooing you'll find all in one place anywhere in the world.
Favourite memory would be winning Best of Show, which was super crazy
and then the other time I also won with my friends with a collaboration which was also a pretty big moment.
Greetings, tālofa lava. My name is Su'a Fuiavailili Lawrence Ah Ching.
I am Samoan Tufuga Ta Tatau, traditional tattoo artist.
It's an honour and privilege for me to be here this weekend in London.
It's been five years now I've always been present at the London Tattoo Convention.
It is really important for me to come over here every year because I establish tattooing over here
first Samoan to register in UK as a traditional artist.
So now I've been moving home six years ago but it is always an honour to come over here.
I do London every year - my only show in UK.
A lot of memories from the past because as you all know, I'm a Samoan traditional artist
and every year we perform the kava ceremony.
This year is really special because the organisers and the crew has been asking us to
do an opening ceremony and also the closing ceremony.
The greatest memories for over here is
there's a lot of traditional artists from around, you know, like you see on this side
artists from Japan, Borneo, Thailand, us from New Zealand and Samoa as well
so it's always a memorable event every year.
It was an honour to be here.
London is always special.
I do conventions worldwide - Europe, America and worldwide.
London is sort of like the central where all the artists meet
like this weekend it's been a lot of famous names like the Leu family
a lot of artists from the states as well
so for me it's always special to come to London to meet friends
and it's always one of the biggest over here in the UK.
My name is BJ Betts, tattoo artist from Wilmington, Delaware
and I'm here at the 15th annual London Tattoo Convention.
I really love coming to the London Tattoo Convention because of the
quality of the artists quite, frankly. I mean we have the best artists in the world from all over the world
and the camaraderie is just unparalleled, second to none
and you know there's none of the attitudes
there's none of the nonsense that comes along with a lot of the other shows
and you know Miki puts on one of the best ones that there is.
That's why it's been 15 years and going strong and I'll never miss it.
I think what makes the London Tattoo Convention so popular with the artists
is, you know, we're all in the same mindset here
we're all here to make some nice tattoos
have good camaraderie and have a great time with everybody, you know
and we're here for the love of the art, we're here for the love of the tattoo
and just to mingle and hang out with everybody.
Unfortunately, we're so busy that we really rarely get a chance to even hang out like we'd like to
but yeah I mean everybody is just such an amazing artist that comes here.
You know that's a tough one, where to rank the convention.
I mean obviously I want to say it's the best and one that I'll miss every single year
and you know, I'm not just saying that, it's true, you know
like of all the ones I do go to, this is one that I love to support my friends, Miki being one of them
and man this is just so far up there. It's hard to rank everything
but I a hundred percent never, never miss this show
and that's not an easy task, you know?
And I know every artist here feels the same way
and that's why you see the same artists here every year because people don't want to give up that spot, man
and they love coming.
I've got so many memories from the convention here over the years.
I mean some of them have been, quite frankly, meeting some of my favourite tattooers
that I would have never met otherwise, you know, because
we have so many people coming from every part of the world
and my favourites between, you know, from Horiyoshi to Filip Leu
to, I mean, you know, all the tattoo artists favourite tattooers are here
and so that's been my favourite memory
just to be able to sit down and talk to these people that I've looked up to for 20 years
and now become my peers and I've become great friends with
and so I think, you know, thanks to Miki and the convention
that's been some of my most favourite and cherished memories of coming to the show over the last 15 years.
I'm coming back as long as I can physically do it.
As long as I'm physically able, I will be here every single year.
And again Miki thank you so much again for putting on an incredible convention.