BME: Body Modification Ezine

A black-and-white photo of a person mid-air in a Superman-style body suspension pose, supported by multiple hooks in their back and legs, smiling joyfully toward the camera. They are suspended horizontally in a large indoor space with high ceilings and visible rigging. A group of onlookers—some seated, some standing—watch with expressions of admiration, amusement, and support. The atmosphere is lively and communal, capturing a moment of shared experience and transformation.

Tattoo, Piercing, and Body Modification News, Events, and Culture

  • Ba-booooom!

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    Oh man, this is triggering for anyone who’s had way too many people in their life do this to themselves literally… I’m reminded of our friend Cory in highschool who was having trouble at home and was going to move in with us to get some distance from his abusive father. About a week before that happened, he got home and walked in on his father banging his (as in Cory’s) girlfriend in the middle of the living room floor. They both just looked at him and laughed and kept going at it… Already in bad shape, Cory walks into his room in a daze, puts a twelve gauge shotgun to his skull and pulls the trigger. The so-called “punch line” to the story is that his family was mad at him, so to punish his friends they had an open casket funeral even though there was no possible way for any reconstruction to be done on what was essentially a headless corpse. Ah, growing up in a small town.

    Anyway, this morbid masterpiece that’s already winning awards was done by Robbie Coventry at b>Inky G’s on piercer Mac “Doctor-Evil” Mccarthy of Punctured.

    suicidesolution

  • Mixed Tribal Influences

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    I absolutely love the mix of indigenous influences in this stunning backpiece by artist Phil Cummins of The Antahkarana (website coming soon to Theantahkarana.com). Obviously the Samoan and other Polynesian motifs are the most obvious, and you can see a very large Haida-like animal totem covering the entire lower back, and that’s only scraping the surface of it. Phil’s work is some of the best neotribal out there right now, and it’s always a great pleasure to see the latest coming out of his studio. Some people might find it offensive to mix these traditional designs into something new, but I think that not just carrying forward this art and culture, but respectfully blending it into something that represents our new global culture, is a very forward thinking way of celebrating humanity’s past traditions.

    phil-backpiece

  • Necro-Ear

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    The result of getting your buddy who learned to pierce by “watching videos” to work on you in his kitchen… is that you’ll eventually end up getting yourself repaired by someone who is actually based out of a reputable studio. The famous and notorious “Autoclave Cookbook” (this really does exist) aside, you should not be able to cook a proper supper in a body modification studio. This ear repair was done by Papacho Body Art and Christian Moron of 316 Tattoo Studio in Caracas, Venezuela. I will never get used to looking at necrotized ears. That is only permissable if you are a zombie or otherwise a member of the undead — and even then it’s completely undesirable.

    necro-ear

  • Sunshine

    Written by

    Rob

    I can’t count the number of times I’ve seen a picture of Rachie wearing black or covered in dirt.  So to see her out in the sun, wearing a white shirt, it’s definitely worthy of a BMEGirls post.

    Photo by Tattooed On My Arm.

  • Skull Skarr, Healed and Fresh

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    This nice even Day of the Dead style skull scar is now a year and a half old, after being cut at Skin of Steel in Toulon, France. I’m also including a picture of it fresh, because as you may have noticed there are lines of different weights. When I first saw scarmasters using the very thin “shading” type lines I was dubious as to the effect they’d have — I thought they’d likely fade completely — but as you can see they are quite effective and carry into the future surprisingly well.

    skullmask

    freshskull

  • Quick Tongue Healing

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    If any part of the body has mutant healing factor, it’s the tongue. I don’t think there’s any other part of the body you can sever in half like this and have it looking so healthy a week later… And that’s what you’ve got here, on the left a tongue freshly split at On Edge in the Hague (onedge.nl) — beautifully sutured as well — and on the right, seven days of healing and the sutures are out and the tongue looks just beautiful. I’m sure they’ll round out a bit, but this person has been quite lucky with how pointy their tips are — very snakelike!

    quicktongue

  • At least the one is funny…

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    Admittedly there are a lot of stupid forehead tattoos out there — Oddee posted a list of their “15 stupidest” a while back — and I’m sure many of you remember the old “STUPID” forehead tattoo from years ago and that tattoo is the very first thing I thought of when Pip showed me this idiotic forehead brand of stupidity… Getting “racist” tattooed on your forehead is pretty much the same thing as writing “small minded” across it. It’s embarrassing. I feel incredibly sorry for this guy and anyone who has to be seen with him. Yikes. Good example of someone trying to look tough, but just coming off looking like a moron.

    stupid-racist

  • Latest Free Fall Suspension Trailers

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    Speaking of the Sinner Team and their amazing free fall suspension work in Russia, a few days ago they posted trailer numbers four and five from this summer’s work. They’re very short clips, but more than worth the watch nonetheless — and of course if you have not yet seen the other recent videos (or their even earlier work), do not miss their Vimeo gallery here: http://vimeo.com/sinnerteam/videos

    The first video is of Josh Fike’s 30 meter freefall (watching him fly past is crazy hilarious), which was also the first head-down free fall suspension. There were small tears on all hooks, but the skin held him and his spine is fine too — they put safety measures in place to protect him in case of overflip. Video two is Switzerland’s Don Lucius (who also paraglides, so I assume he’s completely fearless), the first after Stanislav to jump twice in one day. Sinner Team are one of my favorite groups in suspension, pushing forward hard, but doing so with a keen eye for safety.

  • Sinners in Love

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    Here’s a charming portrait of Stanislav and his wife in Moscow. You probably know Stanislav best from his work with Sinner Team, the pioneering Russian suspension team who has introduced and pushed forward the idea of free fall suspensions.

    sinners

  • Five by Five

    Written by

    Rob

    Shannon posted a beautiful scar by Brian earlier today, so I thought it’d be a good time to show off this set of implants that he did.  Normally we see collarbone implants put in horizontally, so this vertical pattern is a nice change.  It also makes his chest appear to be more angular, as your eye fills in the spaces between the lines.