Jul 26
The Japanese Tattoo
Posted on Sunday, July 26, 2009 in Tattoo Information
From Library Journal
American photographer Sandi Fellman used a rare large size Polaroid camera to create these photos of Irezumi Japanese men and women who wear elaborate full-body tattoos. Fellman treats the tattoos as artworks and their creators as artists. Her text touches on the tattooing process, common motifs, the sociology of the tattoo, and relationships between the tattoo masters and their clients. Author D.M. Thomas has contributed two pages of his reactions to these unus…
Buy The Japanese Tattoo at Amazon
If you have no experience with horimono, this book gives some excellent images focusing mostly on the works of three masters (only one, Horiyoshi III Sensei of Yokohama still actively tattoos). The book is worth buying for the images alone.
And I wish it were the images alone. The captions are often naive, bordering at times on offensive. The author at best over-exotifies and at worse verges on ridiculing some of her subjects, and seems to know very little about the tradition, history, and mores of Japanese society and horimono. Add to that an introduction that is almost unexplainably ludicrous (by an author with no bio!) and you have a book that’s great to look at, just not to read. I’d give it 5 stars if it was just the photos.
Read Takahiro Kitamura’s books as well as Donald Richie’s for better information.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Amazing Book
This is true body art. The most amazing I have seen. An inspiration to anyone interested in the art of tattooing or Asian culture in general.
Imagine life-size Polaroid photographs. Imagine traditional, Japanese, full-body tattooing. Imagine a book of life-size Polaroids taken of traditional, full-body, Japanese tattoos…. this IS that book! Sandi Fellman got the proper introductions and a great toy (a Polaroid that really takes life-size plates) when she went to Japan and set out to document the hidden world of the irezumi, the tattoo underground. This collection is almost all traditional hand-executed tattooing. The details are unparallelled, and you get to see all kinds of shading you might not notice at a distance. This type of body modification still is a secret, private practice in Japan and to view images of this quality is rare.
are you interested in japanese tattoos? yes? then this book is definitely for you! the photographs are great. and the tattoos on display are all done by some of the greatest japanese tattoo masters. the introduction i found rather bad; very artsy fartsy. but it’s only a bit more than a page long. so don’t worry. the complementary text sandi fellman has written i haven’t even read yet – i’ve been way too busy looking over and over again at the tattoos. again: if you’re into tattoos and/or japanese tattoos you simply have to buy this book!
1.0 out of 5 stars
Not worth it!!!
I purchased this book based on reading some reviews that said it had great photos. In my opinion the photos were not that great and the content was lackluster and limited.
4.0 out of 5 stars
Excellent images
This book has great images of some awesome Japanese style tattoos. As others have said, this book is great for the images alone.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Informative, great series of pictures!
This book is an in-depth look at traditional Japanese tattoos, complete with lots of full page photographs.
4.0 out of 5 stars
Japanese Tattoo
Nice artwork. Large pictures, basically information of the tattoo designs, and their meanings. If your interested in Japanese artwork you will like this..
4.0 out of 5 stars
Old, but great pictures
Although the pictures are old, the tattoo-work is still astonishing. A great book for inspiration if you’re like me, planning to tattoo a japanase motiv.
2.0 out of 5 stars
Terrible writing and poor picture quality
On the good side, Amazon service was just as great as ever in delivering this book.
On the bad side (and there are several) this book had a cheap feel about it just…
2.0 out of 5 stars
nice images
The book is nice but some of the photos are not that great in quality. Has some nice designs, but I have to say I expected a little more of this book.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great Art, but subpar writting
This book is worth the price for the pictures alone. Which is good because the writing is extremely sub par, with misinformation and just wrong information.
4.0 out of 5 stars
AMAZING GIFT FOR THE TATTOO ENTHUSIAST
I purchased this book for my boyfriend for christmas who happens to be an avid japanese tattoo lover.