BME: Body Modification Ezine

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Celebrating body modification culture since 1994.

Category: ModBlog

  • When Aghoris Lose Their Ears

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    Martin sent me this video of the autocannibalism fun they got up to at GELOCHT UND SCHARF GESTOCHEN (gelocht.com) in Neuss, Germany (across the Rhine from Düsseldorf). Before I start making obvious jokes about Germans and cannibalism, can I just say this is the best studio name ever? It’s one of those wonderful phrases that doesn’t translate cleanly into English but roughly it’s “holes made and sharply stuck”. Perhaps you have to speak both languages but to me it’s both hilarious and somehow poetic.

    Martin to we’re watching here is the closure of 68 mm (2 5/8″) lobes, which looks like it was very well done, but is completely outshined by the apparently Aghori-inspired autocannibalism ritual in which the soft jiggly but very chewy ear leftovers are consumed. You’d be surprised how common this is (for atheists as well as for those with spiritual justification) in tissue removal procedures and skin removal scarification. I will try and update this entry in a day or two with some more information, so check back if you’re interested.

    Click the thumbnails to see them bigger, or click here for the video.

    yumyumyum

  • Partial ear reconstruction with keloid removal

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    Since I seem to be in the mood for posting stuff about ears being chopped up today, let me share another. My friend Gabriele from Max Art Body Piercing in Rome had a client come in that had a large open lobe that had been previously scalpeled (Ludovico’s ears were 2″ last time I remember them) — as you can tell from the distinctive shape, a “U”-loop of flesh hanging down from the ear — and also had a keloid covering a solid area of it’s upper-outside edge that the client wanted excised, complicating the procedure. To make the procedure even more tricky, they wanted to keep the piercing, but alter its shape and reduce its size. To accomplish all of this, Gabriele cut out the body of the keloid and closed the wound, as well as removing part of the lobe “worm” to tighten the ear to the new size. The jewelry used for the healing is glass with silicone o-rings. Glass is an ideal material, but for some people the o-rings can cause irritation (and must be kept clean to avoid a build up of waste — and becoming a home for bacteria), so the client will have to keep an eye on that. The bruising in the third photo went away quickly, the tissue relaxed, and healing is going well so far.

    no-more-keloid

  • Corset-hawk

    Written by

    Rob

    Fauxhawk? Stitchhawk? Piercedhawk? Anyone have a good name for this?  Whatever you end up calling it, it looks damn good on Blackdon21.  Then again, pretty much anything looks good on him.

  • Ear Pointing Evolution

    Written by

    Shannon Larratt

    To generalize, ear pointing works by cutting a piece out of the top of the ear, and then stitching the open portions together, folding the helix rim up into a point. It is a wonderful optical illusion that this makes it seem as if the ear has a point coming out the top, when in fact the ear has actually been lengthened very little, if at all, since we can only remove tissue — nothing is added. While additive procedures are theoretically possible, they appear currently beyond the reach of the body modification practitioner, if not beyond the reach of most reconstructive surgeons. In the majority of ear pointings done since Steve Haworth first invented them in the mid-1990s, the wedge-removal procedure has changed little — only the location, size, and shape differs (and varying the shape of the piece removed the result can cover a wide range of appearances).

    However, Samppa Von Cyborg expanded the procedure by removing more than just what’s needed for the point, allowing one to reshape the entire contour of the ear. This related example is by Matias Tafel of Rata Body Art in Argentina. You can see from both the stitches and the animation that a long strip running much of the height of the ear has been excised, giving an end result where the ear is narrower as well as pointy. This narrowness brings with it the optical illusion of additional length/height, because it changes the length to height ratio and tricks the mind of the observer.

    matias-ear-animation

  • Ia! Ia! Cthulhu fhtagn!

    Written by

    Rob

    Ph’nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu R’lyeh wgah’nagl fhtagn!!

    This rendition of the Great Old One Cthulhu is by Sean Ambrose, Arrows and Embers Tattooing in Concord, NH.

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