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TATTOOED BODY PARTS (OR MODERN
MUTATION)
In the era of mass
production/ consumption the act of customization is a cultural act. Most mass produced
objects are not designed to be customized. They are conceived as autonomous, closed,
"solved" objects. Customization is a violation of that conceit. The more perfect
and precious the object, the more shocking the act of customization. Consider a Barcelona
chair redone in orange fake fur with candy apple metal parts or pinstriping and flames on
a BMW.
The modern act of
customization of objects, or modifying a product to fit one's own desires or needs, can be
best seen in the postwar American chopped and channel hotrod or the Harley hog with
absurdly extended front forks. Part of the strategy is to shock or outrage by strangeness
or improbability. That's why violation of function is a key element in strange
customizations.
The most precious, thus the
ultimate, object to be customized is the body itself, the home of the soul. The past
couple of decades have been especially characterized by the objectification of the body.
The body is seen as an object to be improved, enhanced and modified. It is acted upon in
different ways. Decorative mutilation, body piercing and tattoos have several things in
common. They are major commitments in that they are irreversible and they involve pain,
making them essentially outsider acts. They are outside the realm of the normal and beyond
those who are not committed enough to subject themselves to pain and irreversible
alteration. Chopping and channeling a hotrod is in a way irreversible as well, a real
commitment, a destruction of the perfection of the mass produced object and entrance into
the dangerous territory of the strange and perverse. It is important that the
modifications involved project the object or the body outside the normal.
This is where modern body
mutilation and tattoos differ somewhat from tribal tradition. Tribal mutilation is
intended to fit a traditional pattern-to ft into a cultural template. Modern mutilation is
intended to signal individuality and to symbolize the position of the outsider, although
that is difficult in a society that consumes, co-ops and commodifies rebellious gestures
instantly. For example, Dennis Rodman performs remarkably perverse acts of body piecing,
tattoos and hair shaping and coloring that are eagerly anticipated by his large audience.
His body art and cross dressing have been embraced by the mass media wholeheartedly as
part of the spectacle of basketball.
Body piercing becomes more
powerful as an act as the location of the piecing becomes more uncomfortable or
inconvenient. Ear piercing is not as shocking as tongue piercing is not as shocking as
genital piercing. Body piercing and decorative scarring is physiological sculpture, the
removal and/or rearrangement of body tissue. It wrests the power and control from the
deity that made you into your hands. You are now in the physiological driver’s seat.
The late century fascination with everything as sign reaches its apotheosis with
the body itself as sign. Tattoos etched into the cells
of the skin are permanent and immutable, fusing with the flesh. The body becomes
a living billboard. Tattoo artists paint on living canvases.
Tattoos are often a life history, of wars fought and loves lost or at least of drunken
nights best forgotten. Some tattoos are positioned so as to become animated when certain
muscles are flexed or twitched. Billboard becomes cinema.
Another realm of body
customizing is enhancement, (or augmentation) the reshaping of the body to fit an ideal
template. Women order up large breasts or small noses and men request larger calves or
penises. This is a continuation of other global traditions like Chinese footbinding, in
that the body is stretched against its will and its genetics to reach a cultural ideal.
However, that ideal is not genetically encoded and thus subject to revision based on
changing fashion (Dolly Parton vs Kate Moss). One can discard a customized object that is
no longer in fashion but unfortunately that is not an option with one's own body. The
ideal augmentation technology would be a kind of dial-a-body mutation based on changing
cultural demands. It could be driven by an internet service connected to polls conducted
by Gallup and Vogue magazine. There are already chat rooms being developed
that allow you to create your own "avatar" or digital embodiment.
The
motivation for
customization comes from opposing forces: the desire for the ideal and the cult of the
strange. The customization of objects, including your body, can place you inside or
outside of certain cultural milieus. The attraction is control. Even with most events out
of your control you can control your image and position within the culture to some extent
through customizing. Body piercing is the price of entry into some subcultures. Once
inside you are rewarded by belonging to an exclusive group. The satisfaction is
intensified by the knowledge that the culture at large (the un-pierced) is excluded. And
in the end the desire for identity is one of the key forces in the phenomena of
customization.
"Everybody wants to see the
pictures,
Ray Bradbury - The Illustrated Man
Captain Bret
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Body Parts (Or Modern Mutations)
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These designs, pictures, Photographs, JPG,s,Gifs, files, logos, Tattoos, images, content are used exclusively by Captain Bret's Tattoo Shop Inc. and represents our company, they are our intellectual property © 1981 All rights reserved. All Tattoos By Artist Captain Bret A. Lohnes ©1981
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Mark protections exist. Said Copyright, Copyrights, Service Marks, Trade Marks
may be filed, owned, by all, some, or individually by the following, Bret
A. Lohnes, Captain Bret's Tattoo Shop Inc. and www.tribal-celtic-tattoo.com
copyright 1981