Freehand Tattoo Artist

My name is Gabor Csobi, but people just call me Gabe. I have been a worldwide experienced tattoo artist since 1992, all the way from Hungary, Austria, Italy, France to the USA, from the East Coast to the Wild West. My specialty is freehand custom tattoos (neither from flash nor tracing).

I began tattooing in 1992 in my beautiful hometown of Budapest, Hungary at the first ever opened Central/East European tattoo parlor called Pozitiv Omen Tattoo Studio, established in 1991. It means I am one of the first generation tattoo artists of Hungary and even in the entire late Eastern block.

In the Positiv Omen Tattoo Studio, six other tatooist and I invented the skill of tattooing and basically planted the seeds of the modern "inked nation" of Hungary. All seven of us became successful and well known around the country and abroad. Most of us at the Pozitiv Omen Tattoo Studio were real "gearheads" and we had ridden self-customized Harleys built from scratch. We were drawing and tattooing at day and turning wrenches at night. We got a lot of artistic influence out of our motorcyclist hobby. Tatooing and riding motorcycles helped develop our creative  outstanding lifestyle.

In 1994, I was invited to the small town of Bra, Italy to open a new tatoo store to help boost the art of tatooing in that vicinity. My Italian friends called me “Gabore” and “Ungherese,” the biker nomad tattooer. With their help, I opened a studio in their independent Harley garage and shop. My shoppe was named Gabor's Cycledelic Tattoo after their motor bike shop called Cycledelic Garage. In those glory days, I tattooed the majority of of the local biker scene. There were a lot of cool folks out there, lots of parties, fun, motorcycle rides, great food, pretty women and the finest wines. Good old days with nice memories. In those days, I was riding my oldschool Harley and driving European classic cars, but I was itching for a real hot rod.

A couple years later, my restless soul asked me to move on. It was mainly caused by my hunger of more international experience in tattooing, my secondary desire of traveling and expressing my "gearhead" passion involving even closer and deeper into the hot rod, custom and rockabilly scene.

I came to America where I found more artistic challenges. I worked for different studios from the East Coast to the West such as Carl Hesse's Word Famous Studio in Phillidelphia,

Pennsylvania, Bill Funk's Body Graphics in Downtown Philly and the great late Eric Maaskie's Classic Tattoo Parlor in Fullerton, California. Not to mention, studios in Ohio, Arizona and Southern and Northern California.

After that, I then I returned to Europe in 2003, where I opened my own shop in Hungary under my name “Gabe's Tattoo Studio”. I was riding my cafe racer, that I personally built in Ohio, and driving my 1964 Imperial out there, but I hadn't built a real hot rod yet!

Two years later, in 2005, the memories of sunny California and it's rich hot rod kustom kulture brought me back again. Right now, I am in gorgeous Orange County, California doing full-time tattooing and part-time bike building, and of course...custom cars and hot rods.

Best regards,