Heeya is a Korean tattoo artist based in New York City. After spending her early childhood in Illinois and Southern California, where she began developing her passion for creative pursuits and winning awards for her art, she moved to Seoul, South Korea. There, she was formally trained in architectural engineering(Yonsei University) before returning to Los Angeles to pursue a degree in landscape architecture(USC). While in school, Heeya also founded her own floristry studio, teaching classes and arranging weddings.

As a result of these formative experiences, Heeya considers three values central to the experience of getting tattooed with her: visualization, communication, and healing. She leverages her understanding of structure toward visualizing clients’ ideas within her drawings. At the same time, her familiarity with wedding planning lends her a special eye for the process of translating a client’s desires and vision to a final tattoo, as well as a passion for helping the client to feel heard and seen. Taken together, these affinities lead Heeya to regard tattoos as containing a healing potential—a way to memorialize moments of significance to the client and to give internal emotions form and visibility.

Heeya specializes in fine line tattoos with emphases on realism and her distinctive x-ray style. She works in both color and black and grey, and is also experienced in creating sketch-style and linework tattoos.