Talismanic Skin

In this Guide to the Underworld, tattooist and artist Rosa Laguna reveals the continuity of tattooing as well as the endurance of the tattooed body.

As humans, we have had the innate desire to seek beauty and express ourselves through art and our bodies since ancient times. Painting, dancing, make-up, the way we adorn our bodies… these forms of expression are closely linked with magic and ritual. Something as primitive as tattoos is, of course, also linked with something as primitive or, better said, primordial as ritual and worship.

In this Guide to the Underworld, tattooist and artist Rosa Laguna takes us through the locations notable for tattooing, techniques associated with tattoos, and the reasons people have chosen to lay ink into their bodies, revealing the continuity of tattooing as well as the endurance of the tattooed body.

Talismanic Skin: A comparative of ritual tattoos focusing on female practices
Rosa Laguna
ISBN 978-1-915933-39-3
16 pages.
A Guide to the Underworld