By Gabes Torres
Psychotherapist, organizer, and artist
Tattooing is a reclamation of my body,
where I consensually welcome a wound
as opposed to the ones that violently invaded my being,
physical and otherwise.
Tattooing is a sacred “fuck you” to colonizers and their attempted erasure of us,
while labeling the ink on our skin as dirty and demonic
Tattooing is a holy permanence on my brown skin,
a deliberate reverence to Indigenous ancestors, whose tattoos
symbolized honor, achievement, and beauty.
Tattooing is a reiteration of “by [my] wounds, [I] am healed.”
—personal notes from the evening I got my first tattoo in 2022
Our bodies carry stories and there are many ways to tell them, with various types of ink and alternatives to paper.
For centuries, tattooing has represented much more than mere aesthetic or a tough facade. The majority of Western cultures and religious traditions have associated tattoos with criminality, primitivity, and other forms of unsophistication. For most Christians, tattoos are biblically forbidden, with verses like Leviticus 19:28 instructing to “not cut your bodies for the dead or put tattoo marks on yourselves.” The case is vastly different for communities outside the West—especially to Indigenous peoples. Tattooing is medicinal and sacred, symbolizing a person’s great milestones, beauty, and bravery. Tattooing is more than decorative: It is a form of devotion to one’s true self and community.
Artistically and resolutely, many of the colonized today counteract the violence of cultural and religious erasure by getting inked. For others, tattooing is a form of body liberation and healing: Choosing to mark one’s body and determining which designs to be permanently marked with is a reclamation.
One Saturday morning, I had breakfast with tattoo artists Alaga and Wiji Lacsamana at Tattoo Nebula, a tattoo and piercing studio in Manila, Philippines. We gathered to have conversations on tattooing, which began with the topic of body autonomy. Lacsamana, who is also an illustrator and author, shared that growing up in a Catholic and conservative academic family, she got her tattoos in secret. This shifted over time when Lacsamana started choosing body placements that appeared more visible to others. But early in her tattoo journey, she recognized the courage that younger Wiji already had before getting inked, even while hiding. Every tattoo was a declaration of self: “This is my body.” Similarly, Lacsamana believes that whenever a person gets a tattoo, “You are becoming more ‘I am’—more yourself.”
This coincides with co-founder of Long Time Tattoo Celeste Lai’s words on the connection between tattooing and body reclamation. In an interview with Welcome to Chinatown, she shares:
“Tattooing is a tradition that has been alive and breathed in new life in our generation. As a queer Asian American, I found a community in tattooing that is all about reclaiming our bodies and our identity. The generational trauma of feeling like our bodies belong to our parents, or belong to the male gaze all fall apart when we are in a space that accepts our nuance in a collective embrace. Being able to hold a physical space for that feels sacred.”
The connection between body agency and tattooing isn’t just about separating from oppressive social conditions but also includes the choice to (re)connect to one’s community or lineage.
In the powerful documentary Marks of Mana, Sāmoan tattooist Rosanna Raymond shares her experience with the art of the tatau, and specifically, the malu for women. She shares that the cultural symbols tattooed by and for women are not to be easily “put away in the cupboard.” Once tattooed, “you are present with your ancestors every day,” because of how these symbols are infused with history and heritage.
Dulcie Stewart tells the story of when she had her tattoos done with Julia Mage’au Gray at The Veiqia Project—veiqia, or weniqia, is a tattooing practice in Fiji where young, pubescent women receive veiqia by the daubati, elder women tattooists, as an initiation to womanhood. Stewart shares her experience:
“At my first session with her, Julia marked me by reconstructing weniqia (tattoo patterns and designs) based on 1870s sketches of Fijian women that we both had seen online. Over the years the process changed, the marks became personal and were based on familial designs. Being marked by Julia is an emotional and personal process, with each marking telling a story relating to different parts of your life; each tap revealing a memory and healing the soul.”
Indigenous communities across the globe also consider tattooing as a preservation and amplification of cultural integrity and belonging. Recently, Vogue Philippines featured the oldest person to ever be on the cover, the venerable Apo Whang-Od. The article not only decentralized beauty standards (“unmarked women were considered imperfect, undesirable”) that are widely imposed and commodified, but also recognized the tradition of the batok, marking the skin through hand-tapping, as a sacred heritage of the Kalinga tribe. Elle Festin remarked in one of the episodes of the series Explained that the sound of hand-tapping is like a “rhythm that wakes the ancestors.” The Onaman Collective, on the other hand, revitalizes the tradition of tattooing as a way to subvert the shame imposed by the church and government by marking the skin with sacred symbols to commemorate their achievements, healing, and visions. A member of the collective, Alethea Arnaquq-Baril, calls on non-Indigenous folks not to use the same spiritual symbols of their tradition. She says, “There are many other ways to honor our culture without appropriating it.”
For those of us who are non-Indigenous, we can still get tattoos as a way to honor ourselves and our lineages without culturally appropriating Indigenous traditions. For example, I was at a coffee shop one day and noticed a beautifully detailed illustration of a piece of Combos, the cheese-filled pretzel snack, on the barista’s arm. At first, I thought it was such a unique and quirky image to have on his skin. I inquired more and learned that Combos were the snack he and his grandmother shared during his childhood. Now that she has passed, my new barista friend honors her memory with this permanent mark that represents their bond. This encounter shows how we can still honor our heritage without appropriating that of another, especially when the sacred symbols are only tattooed when earned and/or inherited within a specific tribe.
Alaga, a tattoo apprentice and artist, considers tattooing a form of ceremony and celebration. As someone who was raised surrounded by strict conditions of what it means to be accepted, Alaga’s first experience with tattooing was an introduction to empathy: the kind of empathy that softens the internalized rules and the need to defend themself and their identity. Serendipitously, their first tattoo was placed on the throat, which, based on a study on Chinese medicine, indicates that the tattoo will activate healing for the closest meridian. Similar to acupuncture, tattooing uses needles, thus stimulating this channel of energy via penetration of the skin. Alaga’s tattoo then stimulated and released the blockage residing in their throat, enabling them to speak their truth and take back their power from a life that formerly hid their identity and denied their reality. They say that tattooing offers “the beautiful potential [for the] physical wound to open up a portal,” enabling the spiritual and physical wound to heal in tandem. Other research shows that tattooing has the potential to build immunity because of the body’s strengthened agility and immunological defenses. (However, this is not always the case for all bodies, especially for the immunocompromised and those with certain autoimmune conditions.)
Toward the end of our time together, I asked Alaga and Lacsamana about their hopes in the world of tattooing. Alaga reflected on a future where tattooing “was more accessible to everyone. Art doesn’t choose, especially among class. It’s the studio’s responsibility to have a sliding scale.” In addition to this, I also wonder what it’s like for tattoo artists to use their work as a platform for solidarity in social movements. For instance, Amanda Echanis is a Filipino organizer who was incarcerated for defending land and human rights. Tattoo artists in Manila have joined the Free Amanda Echanis Network by offering tattoo flash sets, with a portion of their proceeds redistributed to free Echanis, whose three-year-old child joins her in prison. The tattooing campaign will continue on until Echanis is freed.
Alaga and Lacsamana share a similar hope to have more women and queer folks in the tattooing world, as studios have been predominantly masculine in the Philippines. Because tattooing is a vulnerable endeavor for the client, a warmer and perhaps more nurturing energy can provide safer spaces that honor the client’s trust and boundaries. Lacsamana also desires to reframe ideas surrounding femininity and tattoo designs. Floral and soft designs are often mocked and belittled, to which she responds, “Why is girliness a bad thing? I love stepping into my femininity.” She hopes that the tattoo world may welcome the interplay of softness and fierceness, power and gentleness, when it comes to tattoo design selection.
Lacsamana imagines tattooing as a way to give talismans to her clients. She shares that the process turns the client’s vision into something tangible, and, by embedding it onto the skin, “alchemizing tattoos into a talisman.” As a tattoo artist, she understands the mutual healing of this process, being a witness and creator who illustrates chapters of other people’s lives on their bodies.
There is something medicinal in choosing the kinds of scars that mark us. In these practices, we get to decide on these wounds and welcome them, as opposed to the ones that invade us without our consent. Through catharsis and colors, we are free. By our own wounds, we heal.
Originally published by Yes! Magazine, 06.01.2023, under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International license.
