Book Review: Traditional Tattoo in Japan

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bookreview

The publishers at Edition Reuss have done it again, with the beautifully laid out and interesting book, Traditional Tattoo in Japan: HORIKAZU. This book is a comprehensive look at the the life work of Tattoo Master Horikazu, from Asakusa, Tokyo.

Click through to read the full review.

I will freely confess my ignorance to this Master’s tattoo work so it was a pleasure to receive this book and be able to learn about such a highly skilled artist who touched so many with his work. Don’t be mistaken, this is more than just a tattoo book, this is a biography of images and contains not only the artist’s work but also photographs from his own archives, drawings, paintings and a very touching collection of photos from the artist’s funeral service.

Horikazu Sensei was a horishi (a traditional Japanese tattoo master) who, the book tells us, had been actively working for forty years. He worked in the traditional tebori method of hand tattooing. The book begins with an interview with Horikazu where he talks about his past, his education in tattooing, some of his experiences, and personal stories, as well as insights into the beauty of traditional Japanese tattoo work.

Photo by Martin Hladik.

The text contained in the book is not the focus and while the articles are interesting, it is the photos that demand our attention. Personal photos of Horikazu with his family and loved ones give us a glimpse into his life and the way he worked. It feels like a privilege to be able to view photos from his archives, that he collected and saved over his extensive career. These photos reveal his earlier work and stand as a photographic ethnography of traditional tattooing.

Photo by Martin Hladik.

Photo by Martin Hladik.

Also contained within the book are beautiful photographs of artwork done by Horikazu with detailed photos that carry explanations into the designs and motifs. On page 115, we are told that “Lovers often pray to Kannon, asking to be granted the joy of being united in heaven on the same lotus after their death”, with a beautiful accompanying photo of the bodhisattva. These motifs and explanations are as educational as they are a pleasure to look at and would be useful both to tattoo artists and collectors interested in learning more about Japanese art and motifs.

Art by Horikazu. Photo by Martin Hladik.

The photographs of the artist’s work stand as a testament to the love and loyalty of his clients. They demonstrate the patience and dedication that comes from having such extensive work that can only be completed over many sessions and the lifelong commitment of covering one’s body in tattoo work. One of the striking things about traditional tattoos is that while they cover can cover the body from head to toe, they consist of one piece, a design that carries over the entire expanse of skin and transforms the wearer into living art.

Photo by Martin Hladik.

Photo by Martin Hladik.

We are also taken through a Sanja festival, a three day festival that includes drinking, dancing, and as we’re told on page 397, debauchery. This festival is one in which the yakuza (Japanese mafia) are known to take part. Here they strip down and display their tattoos for all to see, and as we learn from this book, regular citizens mingle with these legendary men. Traditional costumes and geisha are seen at the festival and this section of the book is an interesting glimpse at a culture that is very unlike the West.

Photo by Martin Hladik.

Photo by Martin Hladik.

Another contrast of cultures comes in the section of the book that is a memorial to Horikazu Sensei, who died on November 15, 2011. It was the photos from his funeral which struck me the most as the cultural differences between my own Western (Canadian) upbringing and the Eastern (Japanese) approach were profound. I found myself deeply moved by this series of photos and lingered upon them appreciating the beauty in the way this man’s life was being honoured.

Photo by Martin Hladik.

Photo by Martin Hladik.

The final section of the book is devoted to Horikazuwaka (Horikazu’s eldest son) who is also a horishi in Asakusa. An interview prefaces a collection of photos that show how tradition is being carried on, from father to son.

Horikazuwaka carrying on his father’s tradition. Photo by Martin Hladik.

Like other publications from Reuss, this book contains text in multiple languages, broadening the scope of reader to include English, French and German. Unlike some of the other publications from Reuss, this is more biography and cultural history than strictly a “tattoo book”. It holds appeal for those interested in traditional Japanese tattooing as well as those interested in Japanese culture. While this is only about one man it is also a broader look at a culture.

At a whopping book, weighing in at 7.9 lbs. and containing 492 pages. It is meant for the collector, a beautifully put together work of art of its own right (and would make a handy weapon too, I have a hard time lifting it). This is the sort of book you leave on display and will certainly never lose value. It can be purchased directly through the publisher or at Amazon (and many other online retailers).

Traditional Tattoo in Japan: HORIKAZU
Photography: Martin Hladik
Authors: Miho Kawasaki, Fiona Graham, Agnès Giard, Eberhard J. Wormer
Hardcover: 492 pages
Publisher: Edition Reuss
Languages: English, French, German
ISBN: 3943105105
Dimensions: 11.8 x 11.5 x 1.7 inches
Weight: 7.9 lbs

COSMIC EYES FTW

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I have been dying to show you Howie’s latest masterpiece for weeks, but he’s insisted that because of the much higher risk and complexity with multi-color eyes that he didn’t want me posting it until he was sure that they were a complete success. They are of course on Pauly Unstoppable, who was the very first person to have an eye tattoo done (although with a different procedure) by Howie just over five years ago at my house in Toronto when he, Josh, and I became Howie’s first clients and opened Pandora’s Box.

Now, it can be hard to listen when your mind is blown — and if you’re anything like me, this makes you want to shove the next few colored objects you can find into your eye sockets — but Howie emphasizes that is the quickest, easiest, riskiest way to get yourself blinded. He has been developing this procedure slowly and carefully for five years. Because no one listens to urgings not to “try this at home”, Howie is in the process of putting together a seminar/information lesson on eyeball tattooing to (in his words) “minimize the worldwide story of blindness due to eyeball tattooing”.

I would very strongly encourage all artists considering doing this procedure (or currently doing this procedure) to get in touch via lunacobra.net with Howie and get every bit of education they can before putting clients and risk. It’s irresponsible in my opinion to do otherwise. I know it’s exciting and I know you want to jump right into the deep end with your clients, but given how choppy the water is and what the consequences of drowning are, it’s negligent not to get the very best swimming lessons available. And of course clients wanting eye tattoos and other procedures can also contact Howie at that same URL.

Memorial Amputation

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The very oldest example of religion that we have documented is in the form of a voluntary amputation found in a Polish archeological site dating back about 30,000 years — Blake wrote about this for BME back in 2003. Even today there are African, Australian, and other indigenous cultures that practice small digit amputations as a way of coping with mourning and the loss of a loved one. There’s something very instinctual about it in the human experience.

A friend of mine, an experienced cross-spectrum practitioner, recently did this amputation on a customer who had lost his mother, and wanted to do this amputation as a tribute or memorial to her. The procedure was fairly simple, although not as simple as the hammer-and-chisel that many people resort to. He used a number 11 scalpel to peel back the skin, leaving enough skin so that when he removed the bones there would be enough left over to create a flap to cover the wound to speed up the healing. Doing the procedure this way also leaves a more comfortable result, because the amputated finger has a little more “padding” on the end.

Arriving on the Red Eye

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Well, well, it seems that Brazil’s population of eyeball tattoos has just jumped dramatically in the last week, with Emilio Gonzalez having done a handful of them, and also Rafael Leão Dias of Dhar-Shan in Jundiaí, who did the striking red eye pictured below that’s going to leave nineteen year old Mary Jo with a life of assuring people she hasn’t been injured. As I’ve said many times, I really like colored eye tattoos a lot.

I know I’m sounding like a broken record on this point, but I think it’s justified — I really implore people to exercise extreme caution and respect with this particular mod. For example, if a practitioner wants to forge ahead and isn’t interested in playing it safe and waiting until the procedure has been thoroughly developed and training is available, I’d really really urge them to use a similar learning curve to Howie five years ago — do a number of small single test injections and get an understanding of the anatomy and how it behaves with the smallest amount of damage. With eye tattoos, remember too that less is more. You want to inject the absolute minimum amount of ink you can get away with — the more ink, the more risk. Do not underestimate the effect it will have on someone’s life if something goes wrong. Hell, even if everything goes right, don’t treat this lightly — be sure that your client is mature enough (and I’m not saying that a teenager can’t make drastic permanent life-altering decisions — that’s got to be handled case-by-base) to understand that if they do this, they will never, ever, ever have a normal life.

Given how many people — even people inside the piercing industry — are having stretched ears reversed, I have real serious concerns about the regret train that could come smashing into us in ten years over eye tattoos (and that’s assuming that it’s as safe as I believe it is and there’s no larger apocalypse). Stretched ears have a very minimal impact on ones social and public life when compared to eyeball tattoos. I’m not telling anyone not to do these things. It would be silly and hypocritical for me to do so. Personally I think eyeball tattoos are awesome. But more than any other modification, I hope that people treat it with respect and caution. Don’t fool yourself into thinking that because I think they look amazing and you think they look amazing that the world agrees with us. The world thinks we’re fucked in the head for doing this, and I don’t see them changing their mind on that any time soon. And, if eventually they beat us down and make us regret it, guess what? Too bad. This tattoo can’t be lasered off. If you hit the ink particles with a laser, the body can not remove the broken down bits. And you certainly can’t excise the tattoo surgically without destroying the eye. Regrets be damned, because this is for life.

Rafael also posted a video of himself doing the eye tattoo that I posted yesterday. Please, do not treat this video as a “how to”. If anything, note how incredibly differently the first injection and second injection behave — the margin for error in this procedure is extremely slim, and unfortunately the only way to figure it out at present is trial and error because the procedure is still being refined and is still experimental. You can’t sign up for a class in it at the next APP convention. So it’s almost certain that every practitioner that throws their hat into the ring is going to mess up some eyes — over-injection, lumpy eyes, various sorts of damage, aesthetic shortcomings, facial stains, and perhaps even serious injury. Different types of tattoo ink respond very differently (for example, UV ink has responded badly in some people). Again, trial and error. In a perfect world, people would seek out experienced practitioners, and practitioners seeking to add this to their roster would seek out training from those with years of experience. But unfortunately we don’t live in a perfect world. Just remember, if you may a mistake on an eye, it’s not like a piercing or an implant or a normal tattoo — there’s no rewind button. You can’t go back. You can’t go to someone and have it reversed. It’s for life. No going back, whether you get it perfect or whether something goes wrong.

Awright, time to break out the ink syringe!

When life gives you keloids, make eyeballs

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I think that’s how the old expression goes, right?

Ighlif Rendina, owner and piercer at H.F. Body Art in Turin, Italy, had a customer who’d previously gotten a transdermal implant. The transdermal itself did alright, but in time, a large unsightly scar built up over the insertion incision. The microdermal was removed, and the scar reworked using a combination of cutting and cautery branding. The insertion scar became the pupil of the eye, and the scar that formed in the transdermal scar was covered up by the bottom line of the eye. In the picture where you can see the entire eye, it’s quite fresh, about two months after being done, and the picture where it’s partially covered by clothing is current, showing the piece at almost two years old.

Jester Complete Concept Transformation

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One of the most interesting group of people in the body modification world is the small group of at most one or two dozen people undertaking a “concept” transformation — the best known perhaps are those that are performers and exhibit themselves to the world, such as The Lizardman or The Enigma and Katzen. Other like Tom the Leopardman or Stalking Cat Dennis Avner live more reclusive lives, and there are a few inbetween like Eva Medusa. I want to introduce you to another character that’s setting out on this journey, Jester Mayhone, who you can follow on Facebook at facebook.com/JestertheJesterspage. As his name makes obvious, he has set about not just covering himself in clown and jester-themed artwork, but also tattooing himself permanently as a jester in full makeup and costume — I can’t help but be reminded of a “secret society” of street clowns, all tattooed with permanent clown makeup, that I came in contact with via a friend that was riding the rails. In any case, Jester has taken the big step of applying the permanent jester makeup to his face, so I think it’s time to introduce him to the public properly — here is his portrait, and below it you can learn much more about him.

Jester told me, “I think my love for jesters and clowns started when I was a child — I was always amazed by anything related to them. To me, being a jester and being that jack of all trades character has also had a very deep meaning, because I felt that they could express every emotion felt — or rather anything going on — more than anyone else could. It’s the main reason that when I started painting I used the jester as a subject, using the character to express my own, and everything I felt and thought. It seemed like the best way to convey the world around me. I have always been the one joking around, making people laugh, doing crazy things and speaking my mind, without any fear of what people did or thought. I have always been me and made no apologizes for it, regardless of if I was too “out there”, too loud, too goofy, or just too blunt for some people.”

“In old times with kings and the like, jesters were able express something to the king when no one else could. I always thought that was fantastic. So with that in mind, when I first started drawing and painting the Jester to express my thoughts or views, this became my Abstract Jester Series, a series of hand drawings, digital art, and paintings that I continue to paint even now. In fact. right now I am slowly working on re-creating many pieces of art from our history through this series, adding jesters to paintings like ‘The Scream’, and ‘The Last Supper’.”

“I have probably created a few thousand abstract jester images and so the idea of tattooing myself into a jester was something that happened naturally. I was already using them to express myself, what I saw around me, and the views I had. Not to mention my love of the character itself. In fact, my first tattoo was a simple jester, and than I got more and more jester-related tattoos until I decided that the jester should be my theme — to transform my whole body into a modified jester through tattoos. It was already part of me, so it made sense — to represent myself with the very character I love and was already communicating through in my art.”

“I try to put great thought into what I get and usually sit on a design for a while, like with my jester face make-up tattoo. I applied many rough drafts, with make-up, over and over again, to make sure it was perfect for me and my facial structure. As for where I get tattooed, I’ve been going to the same guys at Tomah Tattoo in Tomah, Wisconsin for the last thirteen years. The three tattooists, who all have pieces they work on for me, are Steve May, Dave Fox, and Clay Fox. They are three fantastic artists, which is why I don’t go anywhere else. I have the rest of my tattoos, except for maybe one or two, planned out with the three of them.”

I’ve been watching Jester online for some time, and I was struck how he’s always drawing on himself with marker, constantly fantasizing about who he will become and imagining it as real. To give you a better idea of where he’s going with his skin, I’d like to share a recent mock-up. One of the complications he has — as many people who start concept transformations after being interested in tattoos for some time — is that he’s already got a spotty assortment of miscellaneous tattoos complicating large-scale work. However, once the patchwork Jester’s suit is added, it pulls together successfully.

Finally, as he mentioned, Jester is also an outsider artist, creating bizarre paintings that suit his Jester persona perfectly — I wanted to finish up this post by sharing a small selection of his creations. Zoom in for a closer look, or, better yet, take a look at his galleries. Again, you can find him and follow him on Facebook at facebook.com/JestertheJesterspage.

Where Nipples Go To Die

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When Didier Suarez (APP member and former staffer and owner of San Diego’s Enigma Professional Piercing Studio) titled this picture “Nipple removal – 21yr old nipple piercings”, I thought to myself that twenty-one was a little young to be cutting off your nipples — not that I haven’t seen it before — since you can’t have had the time to really have all that much fun with them yet. Then I realized that twenty-one didn’t refer to the age of the nipples, but to the age of the piercings!!!

Way back in 1991, Didier had Elayne Angel at The Gauntlet pierce his nipples, which he’s had ever since, for twenty-one years. Over time he stretched them up to 5/8″, but then after years of wearing smaller jewelry or none at all, he decided to make the transformation back to small nipples. Didier had a piercer friend cut them off for him — not a deep removal, just the piercings (although the jewelry was removed for the procedure) and enough flesh to sustain the jewelry, leaving a wonderfully grotesque artifact — and then a nurse/midwife friend sutured them for him. It was quite painful for the first night, but quite manageable after that.

Here’s a close-up of the sutured result.

You know, I’ve often been told by genital modification aficionados that the end result of piercing, bisection, and other forms of genital body mod is nullification — amputation. That you live first a life of excess, then you become a sort of physical monk, and remove it all. I’m not quite sure if that is true, and I’ve certainly heard as many people horrified by the idea as espousing it, but I do keep seeing evidence that for notable percentage people it has some truth to it.

Awakening of Gods

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A great but slightly strange suspension poster from St. Petersburg’s Arseniy Andersson of Total Ink. This shot pays homage to their latest show, “Breathe of Apocalypse: Awakening of Gods”, at Arktika Club on the 22nd of September, a short performance piece about ancient Aztec cultural events, dedicated to the Goddess of the Moon. Click the photo to blow it up to desktop wallpaper size, or watch the video below to enjoy the show (you won’t regret putting aside the time, and they’ve uploaded it at 1080p so you can watch it on your bigscreen).

Black Eyes in Brazil

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Rafael Leão Dias of the full-spectrum bodmod studio Dhar-Shan Body Art in Jundiaí tells me that he’s the first Brazilian artist to offer eyeball tattooing, having recently done a few of them, including the one pictured here. As I’ve written elsewhere, it makes me equal parts happy and nervous seeing the multitude of artists (both experienced artists like Rafael, and those with virtually no experience at all) that have decided that they don’t need to wait for others to finish developing the safety aspect of this procedure and are forging ahead reinventing the wheel on eyeball tattoos. I just love the way eyeball tattoos look — not much can compare to it, both for its visual effect and it’s political impact as it’s the only mod where there’s absolutely no going back (other than amputation) — but the speed at which it’s exploding has also meant that there are a lot more people with stained eyes, lumpy eyes, and so on, than there perhaps need to be.

But like I said, this procedure is so exciting that the more you tell people to wait, the more they are raring to get it done TODAY… And I can’t really fault someone for this, because like I also said, it’s that forging ahead that’s always made this community really exciting and fun for me. I just really hope this procedure stays as safe as believe it is and we don’t have an “oh no, what have we done” nightmare moment. Click to see this picture bigger.