Kind Soul offers second chance

SANDPOINT — Preconceived notions are a problem for an Idaho man with a rough past and a local tattoo shop, but in both cases, art is the solution.

Nicholas Wayne, who requested that his last name be left out of print, is rebuilding his life from the bad decisions made in his youth. Once a member of a white supremacist group, he reformed in prison and dedicated his life to helping kids avoid his own mistakes.

Brianna Wurtz, Durst Hayden and Jon Bates of Kind Soul Tattoo, meanwhile, are three young people operating a business that they say can carry negative connotations.

In their efforts to smash those stereotypes, the Kind Soul Tattoo crew is helping Wayne improve his future for himself and his son by covering up his racist tattoos with new, elaborate artwork. And they’re doing the several thousand dollars worth of work free of charge.

“These tattoos are like a cancer on my body,” Wayne said.

“It’ll be a relief to get rid of them.”

According to Wayne, his involvement with racist organizations didn’t derive from ideology so much as a teenager’s need for acceptance. When he was 14 years old, he simply made the wrong friends, who brought him into their white supremacist organization.

“We would go out into the woods, read out of ‘Mein Kampf’ and the Bible and do all kinds of crazy things like that,” he said.

Those friendships eventually landed Wayne in prison on charges of marijuana distribution. While incarcerated, he began to understand the hypocrisies inherent in the white supremacist ideology.

I don’t care if you’re black, white, pink or yellow,” he said. “If you’re a good person, I’ll embrace you.”

Wayne compares his experiences to the development of Edward Norton’s character in the 1998 film “American History X”. The movie centers around an imprisoned neo-Nazi member who rejects his old life and attempts to save his younger brother from his former compatriots.

“‘American History X’ — that’s my life right there,” he said. “I’m exactly like that.”

After being released from prison a year ago, Wayne enrolled in college and began working to establish a career as a social worker. However, his swastika and the iron cross tattoos complicated his ambitions.

“For a year, every single door that opened immediately slammed in my face because of these tattoos,” he said.

That’s when Kind Soul Tattoos entered the picture.

Tattoo artist Bates is well-aware of the negativity some people associate with tattoos in general.

“Everywhere we go, we’re judged and stereotyped,” Bates said. “We want to change that.”

 To combat that preconception, Bates, Hayden and Wurtz are working hard to keep the business involved in the community. To that end, the business owners are offering to do cover-up work on any racist or socially repugnant tattoo free of charge.

“This is the first of many things we want to do to give back to the community,” Wurtz said. “We want the town to see us as an asset and not a wart on the face.”

Bates has already put about 20 hours of work into the sleeve tattoo that will cover up the swastika. In its place, Bates has developed a design portraying the interior of Wayne’s arm as a machine of cogs, pulleys and gears. After coloring and final work is complete, Bates will have worked 30 to 50 hours on the sleeve alone.

“We’re trying to make it so that when it’s done, it doesn’t look like a cover-up,” Bates said.

Wayne said that without the cover-ups, advancing his career ambitions would be impossible.

He currently mans the front desk at a health and welfare clinic in Coeur d’Alene and needs to make a good first impression.

“When people walk into that clinic, I’m the first thing they see,” he said.

From Wayne’s perspective, the people at Kind Soul aren’t just decorating his arm with beautiful artwork — they’re helping put his life back on track.

“To be able to have a guy like Jon step up and do the kind of work that he does is just phenomenal,” he said.