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.

Tag: Suspension

  • Robby Needs Your Help

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    Neil Chakrabarti, whose name you certainly recognize, writes me with this sad note,

    So another one of our beloved members of the suspension community is in need of our help. Robby Seepersad, aka Ribble, is in the custody of the INS and is facing deportation to Trinidad. Robby moved to the US as a child and grew up in Queens where he applied for citizenship. Due to red tape after 9/11, Robby never received citizenship in the US, and in 2009, under extreme mental duress, plead guilty to false charges in NYC and went to jail for eight months. This past winter, Robby was in a car that hit some sleet and slid through an intersection in IL. When the police ran his name, Robby was turned over to the INS due to his previous wrongful imprisonment. Robby Seepersad might as well be my brother. He’s kind, hilarious, passionate about what he does, and is an amazing suspension practitioner and friend. Please help us raise money so his fiancée, Dede Nichols, can marry the love of her life before he is forced out of our country. Please visit http://www.gofundme.com/16qja0 and help save an American Dreamer.

    Over the years I’ve dated a couple people who were so-called “illegal aliens” in Canada — part of Rachel’s current medical dilemma (which is a big part of the reason that BME struggles at times) is my fault for never having properly dealt with her citizenship issues while we were married. I was one myself for a while in Philadephia when I was dating an American. I can not imagine how much more horrific this experience would have been if myself and the people involved didn’t have a home country we knew to go back to. I can’t imagine how much worse it would be if I was facing losing the love of my life rather than just running away from a broken relationship. I can’t imagine how much worse it would be if the country I was being exiled from was the only home I’d ever really known. Well, Robby doesn’t have to imagine any of that. He knows it all too intimately.

    Let me share a few pictures.

    From left to right, (1) Robby, Neil, and other groomsmen at Arwen’s wedding. (2) Robby and his fiancée, Dede Nichols. (3) The first time Neil met Robby, 12/6/09. (4) The back to stomach pull Robby and Neil did after Arwen’s funeral in Long Island on 10/22/11 — his fiancée, Dede, is in the pic as well doing Robby’s bio.

    If there is anything you donate it would help. You can do so at http://www.gofundme.com/16qja0. As always, I would not post something like this, asking you to help if I wasn’t willing to help myself. I don’t just post every request for help people ask me to post. I only post them if I believe in them, and if I believe that donating will actually help.

  • Suspension is not a crime

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    Sometimes it seems like you have to travel to the boundaries of the map, the sort of “here be monsters” zone where you’re likely to sail off the edge of the world, to find somewhere truly epic to suspension. That’s probably just a bit of “the grass is always greener” thinking, but when I look at this picture of Jussi Paradise (photo by Wormz) suspending in Iceland, I feel like it might as well be swapped in for the opening shots of Prometheus or something. “Suspension is not a crime”, September 17, 2012.

    suspension-is-not-a-crime

  • Taking a Dive

    Written by

    Rob

    The gang down at First Blood in Sydney are known for putting out some pretty cool modifications, but did you know that they also have a suspension team?  Here’s Cupcakes in an 8pt modified superman, in which her top half is angled downward into a diving pose.

  • Would you like a coke with your suspension?

    Written by

    Rob

    IAM: Shadowkult prepped for her angel suspension with the B.E.S.T Suspension Team by knocking back a can of pop (or soda depending on what state you’re in).

    Once she was finished she told the team to “Super Size me”, which they obliged by lifting her up to impressive heights.

  • Rolf’s new Cyber Cell jewelry from Samppa

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    A couple days ago Samppa Von Cyborg just installed this great classic Cyber Cell bar into “piercing and suspension celebrity and record holder” Rolf Buchholz. I say “classic” because Samppa made this jewelry way back in 2004, but has been saving it for something special — and when it comes to piercing, there are few as special as Rolf, and Samppa felt the time was perfect to do it for him as a gift. In addition to doing this piercing, he also implanted three hearts (I’m going to assume that this means heart-shaped implants, not three superhuman redundant hearts to make Rolf unkillable, although with Samppa you can never be sure) and a pair of strong magnets.

    rolfbar

    I should mention that Rolf is lucky to be alive — look what happened at the recent warehouse suspension hosted by Muffe Vulnuz. Rolf was nearly eaten!!! Thank God he’s alright, because it would have been a real shame for this community to lose such a remarkable character. Damn those giant suspendee-devouring nephilim that are always sniffing out blood and metal and rope.

    yumyumyum

  • Masaka and Korgano

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    This photo is of Marc (left) and Chandler (right) doing a spinning beam with Berlin’s Superfly Suspension and Kukulcan Rituals, but it reminds me of the eternal chase between the sun and the moon, the hunter and the hunted, always swapping back and forth. Nerd points to those who enjoyed the title of this entry as much as the picture. I know I enjoyed writing it. Either way though I love seeing the joy and laughing abandon in this suspension photo, both in Marc and Chandler, and in those watching.

    superfly-spinning-beam-chase

  • Eu vôo.

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    My favorite thing about this public suspension photo from Enzo Sata (who pierces at Iritsu Tattoo Shop in Sao Paulo, Brazil) is the little sign in the background — “Se te proíbem de ‘subir’, o que você faz? Eu vôo.” (If you’re forbidden to climb, what do you do? I fly.)

    i-fly

  • Warehouse Suspension

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    You’ve probably noticed that when I share suspension photos, they tend to be the outdoor, overflowing with nature, because that’s the suspension environment that gets me off ritually. Of course it doesn’t matter to many people if they’re suspending in a piercing studio instead, because they get sucked into their own world a la DMT and when the Faberge elves are jumping in and out of your chest in the fractal temple beneath the facade of the universe, it really doesn’t make much difference that your body is sitting comatose on your couch with a glass pipe in its hand. That said, these great warehouse suspension pictures from Matt Kirk (a Christchurch native, now of Fool’s Gold in Tunbridge Wells, Kent) hanging care of Muffe Vulnuz’s Extrema Corporis are some of the first indoor suspension pictures in a long time to really strike me as visually powerful and emotive. Superb setting, very profound and beautiful yet dystopian and modern.

    warehouse1

    There’s a second photo after the break (they’re so tall I didn’t want to put them both on the front page).

    warehouse2

  • Parkour Superheroes

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    Or evidence of boredom and idle hands on my part perhaps?

    But seriously, don’t these suspension pictures look like parkour when you edit out the ropes? I was expecting or hoping for something closer to superheroes flying through the air, but I guess you need more height for that. Probably if the pictures were more serene it would look like a levitating monk? If you’re curious, click the pictures to see the original shots by FB/orbism (anchors-aweigh.org).

    orbism1

    orbism2

  • Wheeee!!!

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    I’m not sure where to put “zip line suspending” on my “most fun suspensions” list, which currently has “freefall suspension” at the top, followed by “spinning beam”. If you’re wondering “360 degree rotisserie“, which might seem fun, is at the very bottom after hearing just terrible things about it. Photo: Tayri Rodriguez.

    ziplinesuspension

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