BME: Body Modification Ezine

A tattooed person suspends from hooks, laying flat, one leg higher than the other. Their head is back, and they seem to be smiling, dark hair dangling like an anime character.

Celebrating body modification culture since 1994.

Author: Shannon Larratt

  • Dual SkinTunnels

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    Any time I post Gabriele’s (MaxArt Body Piercing in Rome, Italy) extremely clever SkinTunnel jewelry (which I’ve finally given its own tag here on ModBlog making it easy to see all the entries on it), it always generates a lot of confusion because people aren’t used to seeing something like it, and often make the erroneous assumption that the central circle is open flesh. It’s not. The design is like a transdermal implant, but instead of a single central post, it has two separate U-shaped posts. These U’s have threading on them so that a large top can be attached. In theory, this design should be able to carry more weight than a standard transdermal, in addition to having a unique aesthetic.

    Gabriele’s very first customer for this — he’s slowly and responsibly been doing a few of these, monitoring them carefully, and making subtle improvements in each generation — has come back to get a matching one on their other wrist, so that’s what you’re seeing here in these pictures. For those still having trouble picturing how the jewelry is implanted, I draw your attention to the picture where the two U-shaped slots are being cut.

    Zoom into this second photo for a closer view of the finished product.

  • Lightsabers will cut through ANYTHING

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    I’d always assumed piercing would be more of a sith thing, but he insists that he is in fact a Nasalang Jedi. Oh, Rafa, can you never be serious? Oh and on a more serious note, you may notice the absence of jewelry in this picture, if you were wondering what Rafa looked like with the lip plates removed.

  • Two Great New Dotwork Tattoos

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    I saw two great pieces of dotwork tattooing today that I really wanted to share with you. This first is an upper chest piece by Manuel Winkler at Clockwork Tattoos in Merano, Italy. This design was inspired by the designs of myoshka.jp. It’s perhaps an odd first thought to have, but the first thing I thought when I saw this was that I hope the person isn’t married yet, because this tattoo will look incredible coming out of the top of a strapless wedding dress. Alternately it will be an amazing tattoo to show off at the beach. Or just admire privately in the mirror. Either way I like it a lot.

    The other piece of dotwork that caught my mind today was this mix of psychedelia and sacred geometry by Deryn Twelve of Tenacious Tattoo in Sheffield. I should also mention that if you like Deryn’s designs, she’s been working on a series of t-shirts with her art that will be posted to her Etsy shop soon, so keep an eye open there or on her facebook page — and the mention of commerce also reminds me that BMEshop is finally up and running again!

  • Women’s Chin Scars

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    I don’t want to call these “scarred mokos”, because that would be culturally insensitive, inaccurate, and crass, but when I see these wonderful bold yet feminine facial skin peels done by Iestyn Flye of London’s Divine Canvas (divine-canvas.com), I can’t help but be reminded of women’s facial tattooing among the Maori. There is a long multicultural tradition of tattooing and scarification around the chins and mouths of women being seen as extremely beautiful — the Ainu and the Inuit immediately sprint to mind as well. This reminds me, somewhat unrelated, there is a wonderful APTN/CBC documentary that you can watch online titled “In pursuit of the lost tradition of Inuit Tattooing“.

    Speaking of Iestyn’s work, I’ve mentioned his “scaled” designs before, but he recently did a set that have a double-lined border that I was particularly enamored with. I’m very excited about seeing how these turn out. It’s quite fine cutting, so the scarring will be minimal, but I’m sure they’ll still have a great tactile nature.

  • The Black Eyeball Club

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    I like this club so much more than the Sacred Order of the Black Toe.

    Howie (Lunacobra), the most experienced eye-tattooer, who has been performing and fine-tuning the procedure for longer than anyone else out there, has been doing some very exciting new work that I’m dying to share with you but that is going to have to wait until another post because in this one I’m featuring a set of people with black eyes. First is my friend Marc (little-swastika.com) in Radolfzell, who just had his second eye finished by Howie after having just the one done for quite some time. In the photo on the left he looks like some sort of deranged elf-creature rearing up out of its supernatural lair, don’t you think?

    All the pictures in this entry can be zoomed.

    Next on my list is this customer of Emilio Gonzalez’s (mithostattoo.com) — all of his heavy mods (implants and split tongue) as well as the eye tattoos are by Emilio, and as I may have posted before, this is one of my favorite forehead implant projects.

    Finally, Roni Lachowicz, whose eyes are self done, and finally has her website up at x-roni-x.com. You’ll actually find a gallery of her eye tattoos (as in work on customers, not on herself) there that’s made up (at least as of this writing) of almost exclusively black eyes.

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