One of the most striking modified people I know is Alice, who has a black sleeve, large scarification work, a mudra rib tattoo, a clamps chestpiece that I’ve featured before — loads of amazing work by artists such as Xed Le Head, Daniel DiMattia, Nicole Parish, Benoit, and Samppa Von Cyborg, but I really do get a kick out her little ankle script in faux-Hindi… look carefully, and you’ll see it reads “I’ll surf this beach” — an Apocalypse Now tattoo!
It seems like a lot of the people writing me have had a rough 2007… I remember when 2007 started we had a number of unexpected deaths in this community and a few people remarked what a bad year they felt was upon us, and maybe they were right.
Matty definitely had that experience, so on the first day of 2008 he decided to shave his head and start afresh… He took this great B&W picture that day in his garden and shares it with us.
To help him get through the rough patch, in December he had the chance to do his first four point suicide suspension with the Hack Suspension Team in Canberra, Australia, and about a week later he had the wonderful experience of having Lukas Zpira do a facial cutting on him as part of Lukas’s workshop in Sydney, Australia.
There are some more pictures of his experiences after the break.
Above: Cutting by Lukas Zpira.
Below: Suspension with HACK
Josh sent me a letter about his facial cutting which is pictured below after it was done — there are some great gory action shots after the break as well,
This is a project Russ did on my face about five months ago. The three bars are one for each of my sisters — one older, the bigger bar, and two younger ones represented by the smaller bars. It was one of the most enjoyable experiences I have had mod-wise, excluding my facial tattooing [done after the cutting].
If you visit Josh’s IAM page (his main gallery, currently), you’ll see that he’s in the process of doing an entirely fish themed concept body transformation — his face has already been started with scales. He’s planning on doing scalp scarification so his hair grows into a permanent scale pattern, and implanting three dimensional “gills” on his neck as well.
Sorry I didn’t write sooner in the day. Ryan from BMEshop reminded me that Rock Band is out in Canada now so I picked it up this morning and quickly whipped through beating it on “hard” (the graphics are nicer than in Guitar Hero, but it’s a way easier game)… Sorry, it’s a compulsion! Beating “expert” is next although I don’t expect it to be particularly challenging either (I’m just playing on “Solo Tour” mode with my GH guitar).
Anyway, this super-clean and precise looking skin removal of a set of brass knuckles on a calf was done by my friend Anders at The Dragons Lair Tattoo in Marsden, Brisbane Australia.
Brian in the Netherlands got his toes cut up by the girls from Dare2wear in Amsterdam, with Julia cutting the 666, and Sharon cutting the HELL… Both of them were cut simultaneously, which he describes as a “different” feeling! (Cut him some slack, it’s not as if English is his first language). Julia also did the goat-head cutting on his shin, and Ilya did the spider skin-peelings at Lab360 in Amsterdam.
Brian is also a performer, and recently did this suspension show in Maastricht, The Netherlands, assisted by Raoul and Beto… The facial hooks — my favorite part — were inspired by the movie Hellraiser (and remind me of Casshan‘s shows).
Scott let me know about Martin and Bre’s “new year’s project” on Make in which they use a 25W engraving laser to do a “fingernail etching” using a computer controlled plotter-type device with their hand restrained inside it during the procedure which took just a few frightening but painless seconds. Over time, the “calendar” will grow off of their fingernails — “instead of checking off boxes, we clip off our nails”.
Now, maybe like me you’re saying that’s not really body modification (any more than hairstyles or nail painting is)… But really, there’s no reason that this same method couldn’t be used to do a scarification project on skin as well… I’d just want to be very, very certain the machine was tuned to the right power level!!!
Photo by Bre.
You may recall that quite some time ago, not long after we parted ways, I posted photos of a full back cutting that Charles Finnie and Leia Stafford (pictured below) from DragonFX Kingsway did. The customer stopped by the shop a few days ago, so Lane had a chance to snap some photos of it well on its way to being healed (above of course). I thought this piece was fairly unique because of the fact that it’s fantasy themed — it’s rare to see classic tattoo imagery in scarification, and I think this speaks of just how broad a market there is inside scarification these days.
Assuming it isn’t just a comment on Alberta! 😛
When my old friend Ryan from Precision Body Arts was in London at the start of the month he did this heart branding on a client’s chest — this is a the first time he’s tried the “crosshatch” method of accenting a cutting, first popularized by Dave Gillstrap.
My friend Gillian did a DIY brand on herself about a week ago. She says it was for no particular reason (which I’d say is unusual for a DIY brand — they tend to be ritualistic and full of meaning), but is quite happy with how it turned out (I like it as well). The brands are quite light — she’s been picking off the blisters/scabs, so it’ll probably heal akin to a shallow skin removal, leaving faint circular scars on each finger.
According to RoSPA this is how many fork related accidents occured between 2000 and 2002..
The following self-done branding by Connor though, was far from an accident!
