September 8th, 2010 / 11:37 am
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Justin Taylor
Uncategorized
Official Word Made Flesh Book Trailer Now Officially Official (and Live!)
World premiere, anyone? (EVERYONE!)
Tags: Devereux Milburn, eva talmadge, Justin Taylor, The Word Made Flesh
Great idea. Funnily enough, I’m getting a tat in the next week of Arthur Rimbaud’s head. It will add to my existing tat of David Wojnarowicz’s piece, “Fuck You Faggot Fucker.”
After that? Thinking about this Dodie Bellamy quote from “Mina Harker”: “The monstrous and the formless have as much right as anybody else.”
Congratulations Justin and Eva. This is going to be pretty fantastic.
not just tattoos, but self-portraits
That sounds just right.
There’s some decision-making pressure (for some people, at least), in getting a tattoo, to say exactly what you want to say – not to fuck up the expression through dumb-assed caprice. Is this pressure higher with words – particularly with a quotation – than with pictures? – if the decision simply feels different, how so?
I didn’t see Justin getting a tattoo? WTF?
Yeah, Brandi took the bullet for me on account of my chickening out.
I guess I’ve known people with lots of different relationships to their tattoos- some needed the exact right thing, and others seemed to feel like a more capricious approach was part of the appeal. It’s always interesting to me to meet someone who has a tattoo that they don’t even like anymore–because often that person still remembers the experience fondly, and/or with good humor. I guess that for some people, the idea of a relationship with your body-art that changes over time is the whole point, and if that relationship ends up at (or anyway passes through) a stage of some regret, then so be it. All part of the larger experience.
But just to clarify, when I said “self-portraits” I was actually referring to the photographs people took of themselves in order to participate (or that we took of them). Some of the images are very candid and raw, like profile pics or something, others are composed with enormous care and genuine artistry. Some are self-shots, others were taken by partners, friends, or professional photographers–or, as I mentioned above, me and Eva. Some of the pictures are risque, others show as little flesh as possible. Some have faces, or full bodies, others go to great lengths to either anonymize the person or abstract the body part that bears the tattoo from the body it is a part of. So I guess what I was trying to say is that the pictures of tattoos aren’t just pictures of tattoos, but actual portraits of and by the people who bear those tattoos. Hopefully, you’ll get the chance to see for yourself. Thanks for writing, and cheers.
wait, do you even have a tattoo justin?
tell me you don’t.
I do not. In a part of the video that didn’t make the final cut, I give a lengthy and–if I say so myself–rather eloquent talk about why a person who doesn’t have any tattoos might nonetheless have a legitimate interest in thinking about tattoos as an increasingly mainstream cultural phenomenon, and about literary tattoos in specific as a particularly interesting cross-pollination of sub-cultures. Can you imagine why they would have decided to leave this out? :)
Great idea. Funnily enough, I’m getting a tat in the next week of Arthur Rimbaud’s head. It will add to my existing tat of David Wojnarowicz’s piece, “Fuck You Faggot Fucker.”
After that? Thinking about this Dodie Bellamy quote from “Mina Harker”: “The monstrous and the formless have as much right as anybody else.”
Congratulations Justin and Eva. This is going to be pretty fantastic.
not just tattoos, but self-portraits
That sounds just right.
There’s some decision-making pressure (for some people, at least), in getting a tattoo, to say exactly what you want to say – not to fuck up the expression through dumb-assed caprice. Is this pressure higher with words – particularly with a quotation – than with pictures? – if the decision simply feels different, how so?
referring to the photographs
That was what I thought your primary meaning was, Justin: ‘not just pictures of tattoos, but rather, pictures of people showing their tattoos’. So the document is, self-consciously (as you say), one of the person, the tattoo, the exhibition of the two by the person, and the documentation of that display by the photographer. Cool.
I still wonder if a picture – say, a sunrise, or a dragon – would be more flexible in meaning, easier to be comfortable with as one’s ‘identity’ mutated over decades, than a verbally specific sign. (Of course, a tattoo of, oh, the original Charlie’s Angels might take some explaining – some “good humor”, as you say.) To me, words seem to indicate more of a position, a specific perspective or commitment, than an animal or flower or abstract design.
Since you didn’t get a tattoo even though you agreed to do so for the book, can I have your advance?
Ahem.
I didn’t see Justin getting a tattoo? WTF?
Yeah, Brandi took the bullet for me on account of my chickening out.
I guess I’ve known people with lots of different relationships to their tattoos- some needed the exact right thing, and others seemed to feel like a more capricious approach was part of the appeal. It’s always interesting to me to meet someone who has a tattoo that they don’t even like anymore–because often that person still remembers the experience fondly, and/or with good humor. I guess that for some people, the idea of a relationship with your body-art that changes over time is the whole point, and if that relationship ends up at (or anyway passes through) a stage of some regret, then so be it. All part of the larger experience.
But just to clarify, when I said “self-portraits” I was actually referring to the photographs people took of themselves in order to participate (or that we took of them). Some of the images are very candid and raw, like profile pics or something, others are composed with enormous care and genuine artistry. Some are self-shots, others were taken by partners, friends, or professional photographers–or, as I mentioned above, me and Eva. Some of the pictures are risque, others show as little flesh as possible. Some have faces, or full bodies, others go to great lengths to either anonymize the person or abstract the body part that bears the tattoo from the body it is a part of. So I guess what I was trying to say is that the pictures of tattoos aren’t just pictures of tattoos, but actual portraits of and by the people who bear those tattoos. Hopefully, you’ll get the chance to see for yourself. Thanks for writing, and cheers.
wait, do you even have a tattoo justin?
tell me you don’t.
I do not. In a part of the video that didn’t make the final cut, I give a lengthy and–if I say so myself–rather eloquent talk about why a person who doesn’t have any tattoos might nonetheless have a legitimate interest in thinking about tattoos as an increasingly mainstream cultural phenomenon, and about literary tattoos in specific as a particularly interesting cross-pollination of sub-cultures. Can you imagine why they would have decided to leave this out? :)
For the record, Justin’s talk about not having tattoos was indeed rather eloquent. I wish I could remember it! Perhaps Dev can give us outtakes.
I tried to have a lot to say about tattoos changing, and their meanings changing, and how the self is changing, how the self is not the body, how regret works, but I think all that came out was “it’s a photo book, it’s a book of photos.”
Would love to talk about tattoos and regret sometime but that ain’t what this book is about.
I so hope these tattoos are real and can we please see pictures of them? Arthur’s Rimbaud’s head. Bring it.
referring to the photographs
That was what I thought your primary meaning was, Justin: ‘not just pictures of tattoos, but rather, pictures of people showing their tattoos’. So the document is, self-consciously (as you say), one of the person, the tattoo, the exhibition of the two by the person, and the documentation of that display by the photographer. Cool.
I still wonder if a picture – say, a sunrise, or a dragon – would be more flexible in meaning, easier to be comfortable with as one’s ‘identity’ mutated over decades, than a verbally specific sign. (Of course, a tattoo of, oh, the original Charlie’s Angels might take some explaining – some “good humor”, as you say.) To me, words seem to indicate more of a position, a specific perspective or commitment, than an animal or flower or abstract design.
Since you didn’t get a tattoo even though you agreed to do so for the book, can I have your advance?
Ahem.
For the record, Justin’s talk about not having tattoos was indeed rather eloquent. I wish I could remember it! Perhaps Dev can give us outtakes.
I tried to have a lot to say about tattoos changing, and their meanings changing, and how the self is changing, how the self is not the body, how regret works, but I think all that came out was “it’s a photo book, it’s a book of photos.”
Would love to talk about tattoos and regret sometime but that ain’t what this book is about.
I so hope these tattoos are real and can we please see pictures of them? Arthur’s Rimbaud’s head. Bring it.
well, i think we are all cognizant what this book is about.
justin, the part they left out is the meat. i would much rather read about this aspect than anything else.
well, i think we are all cognizant what this book is about.
justin, the part they left out is the meat. i would much rather read about this aspect than anything else.
Whenever I think of tattoos and regret I remember when Harry Crews talked about waking up from a black out and finding someone had tattooed a hinge on his elbow. I think it was on the Dennis Miller show in the early 90’s.
He also has an e.e. cumming’s poem on his shoulder, the line about “how do you like your blue-eyed boy, Mister Death.” I’ve always wondered if that might have been a reference to his own infant son’s drowning as well. I don’t remember reading anything on it, but that would be a literary tat with a vengeance.
Whenever I think of tattoos and regret I remember when Harry Crews talked about waking up from a black out and finding someone had tattooed a hinge on his elbow. I think it was on the Dennis Miller show in the early 90’s.
He also has an e.e. cumming’s poem on his shoulder, the line about “how do you like your blue-eyed boy, Mister Death.” I’ve always wondered if that might have been a reference to his own infant son’s drowning as well. I don’t remember reading anything on it, but that would be a literary tat with a vengeance.
Chris- Yeah, we heard about the Crews tattoo, and yes, Crews meant it as a memorial to his son. He may, in fact, have taken his inspiration from Kesey’s use of that same poem when his own son died in the early 60s–an episode recorded by Tom Wolfe in Electric Kool Aid Acid Test. Though we weren’t able to get hold of Crews, we do have an image of that very same cummings line, inked on a guy named Jamie who lives in Gainesville and has some personal acquaintance with Crews. Jamie’s reasoning for getting the tattoo- “that’s the tattoo Harry Crews has.” And there you have it.
Chris- Yeah, we heard about the Crews tattoo, and yes, Crews meant it as a memorial to his son. He may, in fact, have taken his inspiration from Kesey’s use of that same poem when his own son died in the early 60s–an episode recorded by Tom Wolfe in Electric Kool Aid Acid Test. Though we weren’t able to get hold of Crews, we do have an image of that very same cummings line, inked on a guy named Jamie who lives in Gainesville and has some personal acquaintance with Crews. Jamie’s reasoning for getting the tattoo- “that’s the tattoo Harry Crews has.” And there you have it.
There’s an argument to be made that 90 percent of tattoo art derives from William Blake.
I was a student of Crews’ when he got his tattoo and mohawk. When I asked him about it, he said, “I got the do and the ‘too on the same day and with the same purpose in mind. And that was to know again what it was like to be an outsider. I walk into a room, people take a look at me and I can feel the anger rising up, coming off them like heat off a stove.”
Ever since, I’ve wondered what line of poetry or prose I’d get tattooed on me, were I the sort to get that sort of thing done.
P.S. I think I’d go with another ee cummings quote: “Pants Pressers of the world Unite! You have nothing to loose but your pants!”
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