Tatau

Tatau is the Samoan word that gave the world "tattoo." It names something older and heavier than decoration: a story written into the skin, meant to be read. In 2018 I photographed tattooed bodies at [the Mondial du Tatouage in Paris]. I thought I was doing reportage. As always, I was wrong. Something else surfaced. Inked backs dissolve into walls of flash art, geometric patterns continue from skin to backdrop, bodies become pages of the very books that surround them. Between the machines, strangers offer an arm, a chest, a spine, without a second thought.