Faster Than A Speeding Bullet
A young, Latinx woman finds herself starting out in the career of her dreams, independently owning and managing an inclusive, safe space tattoo studio within just a few months of getting her hands on her first tattoo machine.
In September of 2019, Daniela Jimenez-Duenas was driving around the familiar streets of Tecate, a town along the United States and Mexico border, unwinding after a particularly mentally exhausting day. Her personal life was at a crossroads. She was going through a separation from her partner at the age of 24 and contemplating the future for herself and more importantly, for her son.
As she reflected, the hot day started to cool down and the sun cast its setting shadow across the horizon of billboards and gas stations, taking with it Daniela’s anxieties. In an unexpected turn of events, that same evening she was handed a cardboard box by her friend, Ruben A. Romero. The small cardboard container cradled an electronic, metallic mechanism that she never expected to hold in her hand, despite her artistic aspirations.
“He pretty much said, here’s a machine, I believe in you. You don’t have any reason not to do it anymore,” remembers Daniela, who had not experienced that kind of support from a partner regarding pursing her passion of becoming a tattoo artist.
The handheld tattoo machine was the symbol of hope for Daniela; a symbol of freedom and creativity that she repressed for years by limiting her sketching and illustrations to just a hobby, which she anticipated every evening after getting home from her day shift at the local Juicebox, a smoothie and juice bar.
Upon connecting the device to an electrical outlet for the first time in her mother’s mobile home, now Daniela’s tattoo and plant shop, De la Bala Shop, the buzzing vibrations fit together the missing pieces that she would need to survive and thrive through the global coronavirus pandemic.
“What surprised me was that, even though there is a pandemic going on, it seemed like more people wanted to get tattooed…It’s like they are annoyed or they want to get rid of the stress in some way,” said Daniela, known as @hijadelabala on social media, which translates to “daughter of the bullet.” “So, then I started getting a lot of business and I was just starting out, so I was stressing out like, ‘What am I going to do?’”
In July, amid the peak of rising cases worldwide, Daniela left her position at Juicebox to focus on her evolving career as an independent tattoo artist. Thanks to her family and friends, the power of word-of-mouth and social media made Daniela a better-known artist and her tattoo studio a safe space in her community, what she endearingly refers to her “pueblito” of Tecate.
“I thought it was going to get worse because of the pandemic,” she said, referring to the new amount of clients who kept emerging, seemingly out of nowhere. “But it has been the complete opposite.”
In her childhood, Daniela spent most of her time drawing with her four sisters. Raised by a single mother, she and her sisters spent their youth moving around Northern Mexico, settling in Tijuana for a period when they lived with their grandmother. There, Daniela’s older sister, Mariana, recalls being impressed by Daniela’s creativity when the two sat down to draw Bratz dolls.
“I remember I only drew, like the face and a ponytail. That’s it. But Daniela drew the lips all big and the lashes, with a lot of detail. And I was just taken aback, like, ‘Why can’t I do that?’” said Mariana, joking about envying her sister’s natural artistry.
In elementary school, Daniela won multiple art contests, which provided her with the art supplies she used to improve the same skills she watched her father, “El Bala,” uniquely interpret into his Picasso-inspired artwork. As a self-taught artist, Daniela relied on the internet — cartoons like the Powerpuff Girls and Rugrats — and artistic genetics from her father and mother, who dabbled in photography as a hobby, to find the inspiration to believe in her artistic abilities.
“I remember in life-planning projects I did at school, I would always write down that I would like to become a tattoo artist, even if I didn’t really know what it meant,” said Daniela. “Our resources were always low so I never had enough to take a drawing class, much less a tattoo class.”
Then in February, Mariana was scrolling through Instagram when she stumbled upon a video story that featured Daniela putting ink to skin for the first time on their younger sister, Natalia, who got marked with her birth year on her ankle and a heart and flames on her finger in one sitting. As described by Daniela, the gentle push by Natalia to get her to practice on her living body, vastly different from orange and banana peels she’d previously penetrated with needle and ink, was enough to inspire Daniela to take her talent to a more professional level.
“I just heard my mom’s voice saying, ‘Don’t do it, don’t do it!’ I did my first tattoos on my middle sister, and since then I never stopped,” Daniela said, describing how the rest of her sisters were soon lined up behind Natalia. “When my mom saw it, she was like ‘Why did you do that on her? She looks like she is in a gang!’”
Staring at her telephone screen, Mariana gawked at her sister’s tenacity and drive, while admiring her ambition to pursue a career that has been calling her name since they sat down together as middle schoolers in 2004 to watch TLC’s Miami Ink on cable television in their grandmother’s living room.
“I would always think, I would like to make a living making drawings, too,” said Daniela. “And I was really young then. That’s something that always caught my attention.”
While the sisters reminisce about the endearing moments of their childhood, the Jimenez household was usually low on income, depending solely on a mother who continues to travel seasonally across the border for work, taking jobs located along the West Coast to financially provide for her daughters.
“I feel a good sense of pride that we have never needed a man to provide for us,” said Mariana. “Our energy, our little circle, has always been solely women.”
In the traditionally conservative backdrop that is Mexico, seeing a woman tattoo artist thrive in a self-starting business is as unknown as seeing a dog walking on its hind legs. Coming from a strong, matriarchal presence in her immediate family of four sisters, a grandmother from her mom’s side and a single mother, their undying support has been nothing short of a blessing for Daniela.
“I was someone with a lot of insecurities, always unsure, but when I started up, even my most religious relatives, they [supported] me. My grandma wants me to give her a tattoo,” said Daniela, surprised at the support she has received from her family. “I have been very blessed in that sense.”
Romero, Daniela’s boyfriend now, gifted her the tattoo machine that September evening and describes her as an optimistic, down-to-earth, and “shiny” person.
“How she treats a stranger is how she treats people in her personal life,” he said, praising her calm and relaxed demeanor.
The pair first bonded over their artistic hobbies of which Romero, who is a photographer, believes to be a natural part of who Daniela is.
“In some way, she incorporates it in every part of her life. And it is really cool, because that is very her. It is very representative of her,” continued Romero. “If she didn’t have art in her life, she wouldn’t be Daniela.”
They are in the process of moving De La Bala Shop into Romero’s home, who witnesses the devotion that his girlfriend has to her craft, even getting his first tattoo by Daniela on his leg, of a hand holding a cigarette, at the age of 31, and has continued to get work done by her.
“When you are engrained in something, it becomes your worst enemy at certain times and that’s good, that’s really good for people, because you learn to have patience and you dedicate more love into what you do. Daniela has that,” Romero said.
Since dedicating her life to tattooing full-time at night, her mornings and afternoons revolve around her 5-year-old son. She assists him with remote learning after feeding and clothing him, tends to her home and garden, then helps him with homework until her clients begin to arrive to their appointments in the evenings.
Daniela and her son enjoy sketching together. She works on new tattoo ideas while he draws whatever comes to mind. He does, however, look forward to the day his mother can teach him the ins and outs of tattooing. Until then, Daniela sits him down on the sofa in her garden-like studio with a tablet or a pencil and paper to sketch while she practices her skills on actual human skin.
“He started drawing so many things. And lately he has been asking if I can teach him when he grows up and if he can get a Spiderman tattoo when he gets older,” Daniela said, smiling. “So I say yes, when he is older he can decide whatever he wants to do with his body.”
She recalls going through a “hippie” stage in her past when she began connecting back to mother nature and her heritage by attending native American ceremonies, which is where she realized the life-changing effects that nature has on maintaining inner peace and spirituality.
“That’s where I feel I connected with my Mexican identity and with nature,” said Daniela. “To put it simply, plants bring me peace.”
Ever since making that deep connection with wild and potted plants, Daniela has grown and nurtured a variety of plants in her tattoo studio, which adds a peaceful and relaxing atmosphere for her clients, something she aspires to create for everyone she tattoos, especially women.
“Almost all of the artists I admire are women,” said Daniela, stating Miami Ink and LA Ink star, Kat Von D, a tattoo industry pioneer, as a major inspiration growing up. She also mentioned Sandra Ortiz, a Tecate-based tattoo artist who is gradually climbing the ladder in the field.
“I have always seen myself in a studio that I liked, and I would hire only women, “ continued Daniela, revealing how uncomfortable and intimidating some situations can be for women getting work done by men or tattooing on men. “I have had a handful of experiences with men… I did not like it.”
“Getting a tattoo is a very intimate moment with whoever is tattooing you. You’re very close to someone for a long time. Some women may feel uncomfortable and that is understandable, so it would be cool to have a place they can go to feel safe,” said Romero, who is fully supportive of Daniela’s ambition to open a safe and secure tattoo studio that would cater mainly to women. “I’m all for it.”
She remembers when she was first flirting with the idea of tattooing how much she was looking forward to meeting an established male artist in Tecate, hoping maybe he could teach her or help her get started in the industry. Instead of a warm meeting, Daniela was instead met with an outdated mindset and sexist comments that threw her off-guard.
“Here in Mexico, machismo still exists. They don’t think that you can make it, too,” explained Daniela. “Because of him I learned to say, ‘Fuck you. I am going to do it on my own.’”
With plans of traveling to the tropical coast of Mexico to Nayarit with Romero in the near future, becoming an established artist in Tecate and creating a safe space for women to get tattooed in comfort are long-term goals for Daniela, who can count on the support of her friends and family to assist her in achieving the level of success she aspires.
“A lot of us don’t have the luxury of saying, you know, ‘Well, I do what I like,’ or ‘This or that comes easily to me,’” continued Mariana, who mentioned that it was an honor to have been tattooed by her sister.
“I think Daniela is going to be very happy with her work and everything she does.”
