Shapeshifting: Towards Being Seen
2019 - Tulsa Artist Fellowship
While in Tulsa, I began the first iteration of an ongoing oral history initiative that accompanies covering and re-working tattoos on individuals exiting the prison system. "Shapeshifting: towards being seen" opened on September 6th, 2019. The exhibition included documentation of the tattoos both before and after, as well as a recorded oral history component with a focus on investigating how experiences with incarceration shift perspectives on tattoos.
Tattooing becoming mainstream in recent years has relied heavily on distancing itself from stereotypical associations with criminality. This effectively doubly marginalizes those who do have a history of incarceration or have been impacted by the criminal justice system. Tattoos that are gang related or that are perceived by others as poor quality can be a barrier to employment and other systematic and social engagement. By researching this site of overlap, I hope to push back against the respectability politics present in the tattoo industry and to address the stigma of tattoos (most often wrongfully) characterized as “criminal.”
Through partnering with Ritual Electric Tattoo and Resonance Tulsa, I worked with women to record narratives and visuals that create a more complete and nuanced picture of tattooing’s potential for personal empowerment, centering their voices and experiences as tattooed people. Themes that arose are tattooing being a vehicle to assert an authority over one’s body that cannot be taken away by the state, having a memento that maintains a connective thread to a life outside prison walls, and being able to maintain a sense of individuality in an environment that aims to strip that away.