Chef-turned-tattoo artist Dorje Meta on his trade-off of pots to tatts.Dorje Meta wears his white chef's jacket bearing his name to work. But instead of using his hands to put together a culinary creation, Meta uses his hands to hold a tattoo machine to ink one of his artistic creations on someone's body.
His personal tattoos mix with scars from burns and cuts he got while working in the kitchen. "You're in the heat of a moment and you're trying to julienne six pounds of onions — you're going to cut yourself occasionally," says Meta, 29.
A professional chef, Meta recently switched careers to become a full-time tattoo artist at Inked Memphis. "I love being creative. I love tastes. I love salt, acid, fat. I love cooking and designing menus and designing food and serving and nourishing people," he says. "But the other part of it isn't glamorous to me. I don't like working line. I don't like managing a bunch of people.
"I had learned and gotten the experience I wanted from it, but what started nagging me was I want to be a tattoo artist."
Meta, who grew up in Panama City, Florida, got his first tattoo — a Tibetan mantra on his right arm — at 14. "I got it at my buddy's house. He was like, 'Look, you gotta come. My mom's boyfriend's out of jail and he does tattoos.' I was fascinated by it. He had this machine that he built from CD player motor parts. He had a paper clip that he sharpened down to a point, and he made the ink.
"I bought some equipment and started practicing on my dummy friends who let me butcher their skin," he recalls. "Then I naturally fell in with some people who actually did tattoos."
When he was 16, Meta was the "unofficial apprentice" at a tattoo shop. "I was there all the time. It was a biker shop — like a Hell's Angels sort of situation."
Meta got into a lot of fights at the shop, but he also got a lot of tattoos. "My mom found out I was hanging out there and she had an issue with it, but she kind of accepted that I was going to do it 'cause I'd show up every day with some new artwork on me," he says. "These guys showed me how to use real machines, how to use a clean station, how to respect the skin."
He moved to Goodyear, Arizona, where he opened a martial arts school at 18. He also went to work at his first restaurant, where he learned to make Thai food.
Meta got some professional tattooing equipment and went into business.
In 2016, He moved to Memphis, where his first wife's family lived. His first restaurant job was at Next Door American Eatery. He then worked as a sous chef at Bishop.
But his love of tattooing was stronger than his love for cooking. In January, Meta went to work as a tattoo artist at Inked Memphis.
Meta likes realism. "I do color, but I prefer black and gray. Soft tones, fine detail, but natural things," he says. "I love studying skulls. I love portraits and faces."
He lets tattoo artists practice on his body. "The moment I trust somebody who's artistically inclined, I showed them the medium, but I say, 'You have to learn on skin, practice on my legs and arms.'"
Meta has about 50 tattoos. "I have tattoos on my back, on my legs, on my arms, feet, and toes. I fell asleep and one of my apprentices tattooed my feet — a heart on one of my toes and a series of dots on one of my other toes."
He also has a tattoo of a chef's knife on one forearm. "I will never part with my favorite knives," Meta says.
"I love cooking. I do. I feel amazing after a shift. I actually show up to work. I want to be there. I want to work with people. I want to sweat. I want my feet to hurt," he says. "But then I'm like, 'I want to tattoo.' When I'm done with tattooing, I'm on top of the world."
Inked Memphis is located at 565 S. Highland, 425-3961.