If you look at someone with a tribal sleeve and feel it's over-done, and maybe it is very popular, it still has strong implications to the wearer. Some people may purely find it attractive aesthetically, but I feel the one with the tattoo will have gone through alot to get the tattoo.

Whatever the design or size, getting a tattoo is a big occasion because you are effectively modifying your body forever. It can make you feel more confident, sexier, remind you of a loved one, an important point in your life. Whatever emotions it evokes, the fact that it does this at all proves to me that tattoos are deeper than is widely given credit for.

Because they are currently what you may call a trend, because they are widely popular, the meaning becomes ignored as opposed to lost for the most part. It's a whole new thing to have body art slowly become part of the mainstream and alot of people have never cared for or even considered the subject of tattoos before. There's a lack of understanding and an abundance of ignorance, which those of us with visible tattoos I'm sure have all experienced with comments and questions such as "you do know those are permanent?".

Tattoos are still life changing, powerful, spiritual almost. It bring us closer to ourselves, helps us express what we wish to express. It is an art form and I for one am glad at it's rising popularity, finding tattoos attractive and interesting it just makes it more pleasant for me to walk down the street!

if it is monday, i must be at the airport.  i'm off to boston today.  (having breakfast at that same chili's from a couple of weeks ago - hopefully hottie manager will be there again).

here's today's lot of hunky inked guys.  i have a feeling some of this ink will freak some of ya'll out.  just deal.  there's something sexy about all of 'em:

Tattoo??

Yeah guys! What if I can have a tattoo?? Will I have it?

This thought occurred in Jan's class when my friends were presenting their work infront of the class. I was kinda bored and started looking around, looking at my friends, playing with my pen, make people annoyed. Then, I looked at my left arm and started drawing E letter on it with my black ball-pen that I finished playing with. That's where the 'tattoo thought' came..

I turned to Shah and Nurul who were sitting beside me, asking them if they were interested to have tattoos.

Emy              : Weih, klo la kiter sumer bleh buat tattoo kan, korg raser korg nak buat x?

Nurul            : Nak! (Nurul nodded her head, very confidently)

Shah             : Nak! Nak! Aku nk buat kat cni, kat cni, kat cni... ( Shah showed me where she wants the tattoo to be carved)

Emy              : Kiter pon nak! Kiter nk buat 2. Satu kat cni, satu kat cni.. Eh, nk 3 la. Satu lgi kat ankle. And kiter nak tatoo tu bersambung, so nmpk mcm ankle bracelet la... Haha! Cool!

Shah             : Ha, satu lgi aku nk buat kat cni. (Shah pointed her right eye, near the lid).

Emy              : Eii, sakit r buat kat ctu..

Shah             : Haah, tpi lawa.. Nampk mcm org sedey je.. Mcm menangis...

Emy              : Owh... (Thinking.. "Okay, that's weird"..)

So, yeah I wanna have tattoos!!

At my back,

at my left shoulder,

and, at my left ankle!

Those are cool tattoos, but I'm pretty sure I wont have an elephant tattoo on my shoulder. Hua9.. So, why do I wanna have tattoos..??? Haha! Comon! If you looked at me, and knew me, you'll know that I'm kinda a girl who wants to have tattoos. :-D

HOWEVER,

I dont need you to tell me, but I know that I CAN'T HAVE ANY TATTOO.. And I won't even argue why I can't have tattoos. This entry is just for fun... I was just trying to explore the 'what ifs' in my head, and that's about it.

So, if u guys ever read this,

• Mak and Ayah, which I'm absolutely sure you guys WILL NOT,

• KakEda or Abg Bob, who are incredibly famous in Abdul Malik's family for their 'kaki report attitude', who tell everything to Mak, no matter how hard they convinced you that they wouldnt,

• and  all my friends... for whatever reasons are worried about this entry,

just wanna tell you, don't worry. I won't have them.

Promise! :-)

p/s - to KakEda and Abg Bob, don't make up other stories, okay?

Today’s blog, for all my chirpy I-actually-quite-like-Mondays efforts, may not contain the overwhelming feeling of warmth and positivity I normally try and impart on you all.

You see, this weekend was a bit of a shitter.

I am considerably poorer, I had a hangover for the first time in a very long time indeed, and I completely wasted about six hours of my life.

But honestly, this morning, I feel pretty good. It was just the weekend that sucked balls, ok?

And it actually started pretty well.

I went home Friday, had a very pleasant meal indeed, worked exceptionally hard in the gym and felt great, and got off to bed at a decent time, falling asleep as I normally do on a Friday night to the sights and sounds of Jools Holland TV show – a music show on BBC2.

I woke up Saturday morning at a surprisingly late time for me – about 9am, and, after a leisurely breakfast, began to get ready. Today was tattoo day.

It was about 11am that I started to chicken out. I began second guessing where I wanted it, and if I was actually doing it for the right reasons. These aren’t things you want to get unless you’re 101% sure.

So I decided not to go, and instead decided what to do with my day. I guess I was beating myself up a little at this point – I wasn’t in the best mood.

But then, the mail arrived, and my demeanour was (albeit temporarily) lifted. I had received a letter.

So quick was I to open it, glad to have something to do, I didn’t quite realise that I had recognised the writing on the front to be my own – it had registered, I just hadn’t had that ‘oh’ moment.

And there it was. Over two months after my course completion, I had received a letter from myself, written on the final day of my course, detailing every wonderful emotion I was feeling at that time. ‘Don’t forget these moments, and who you are’ I was telling myself. This was me at my greatest, telling myself not to let go; not to forget.

‘Fuck this’ I thought, went upstairs, took a shower, and got in the car. ‘That David would be doing something ‘in the moment’’ I thought. ‘Better not let him down.’

I guess it was about 15 minutes into my half an hour car drive into Camden Town that I thought to myself. ‘No… wait.’ Once again, I was plagued by doubt. 5 minutes later, and feeling pretty crappy about the way I was constantly second guessing myself, the car was turned around and I was driving back.

I texted a friend of mine, Ashley, to see what he was doing that night, and 5 minutes later, I had an invite to go to Roadhouse, a bar in Covent Garden. If I am being honest, I had known that texting Ashley meant I would end up being invited out, and I knew that going out with Ashley meant I would be having some drinks – not a usual practice for me, and with good reason.

But anyway, I was ‘swimming in the shit’ as was once famously (well, famously to my Hoffman group) said, and rather enjoying feeling like crap. After wandering some shops looking for ANYTHING to fill the gaping hole I was feeling, I bought some trousers – I know, exotic or what? – and quickly made my way home, very excited about the prospect of blowing off some steam.

There is a reason I do not generally drink is because, simply, drinking and I do not mix. All the extremities of my past life seem to divulge into one when I drink – it’s like all the focus on self destruct and self hatred are zoned in on that glass, and I won’t stop until I feel in myself that I have reached my limit – which, occasionally and thankfully, does happen from time to time – or I just get to the point of near-oblivion.

Let me give you an example. On Saturday night, I was never without less than 2 glasses of drink in my hand at one point for the first… 3 hours. I was out with two other people, and when it was my round at the bar, I would order 4 drinks – 1 for each of us, and 1 for me to down while I was waiting for the barman to return with my credit card.

By the time we left Roadhouse, and went to another club, Carbon, I was pretty drunk. I managed another couple of drinks when I got there, but the damage was already well and truly done.

After taking a cab home, I somehow managed to lock up the house properly, and collapsed into bed, having (and this is something I realised only the morning after when I woke up) perfectly folded and hung up the clothes I was wearing – even to the point of replacing the shoe trees in my shoes, and re-balling up my socks. It was quite a surreal sight.

Rather predictably, I was hungover. Being that I don’t generally drink, and therefore have a low tolerance, and then combining it with my occasional need for excess and punishing my body, my hangovers are really bad. My body just doesn’t know how to deal with it any more.

I woke up around 11 – not bad seeing as I’d got back around 4 – actually feeling ok. Sluggish, but mostly ok. I actually managed to get up, and even (for some reason as I was naked and bloody freezing) managed to walk over to my laptop and have a quick glance at my emails. About 20 minutes later, I realised all was not well in the world of David, so I stumbled downstairs – still naked and freezing, being that I didn’t feel like my head would take the sudden movements and jerking of putting on a t-shirt.

I managed a glass of water, and about 2 bits of a piece of cake before quickly returning to bed, presumably hoping that I would wake up when either hell had frozen over, or this hangover had disappeared.

I was however consciously aware that at some point I would have to get up. A friend of mine had set me up on a date that night with someone called Sara. Sara and I had spoken on the phone, done the whole exchange of pictures thing, and generally got on very well. It was for that reason that really, I didn’t want to not go, despite already being aware that I was going to be some way off my best form.

Do not ask me how, but at about 3, I somehow managed to get up, take a shower, and gingerly make my way to buy some flowers for that evening. What can I say? I’m a gentleman.

Feeling somewhere beyond delicate, I managed to get back home, went back to bed for 15 minutes (seriously) took another shower, marvelled at being able to keep some food down, and feeling absolutely awful, made my way to West Hampstead to pick up Sara.

I picked Sara up at 5.30, pretty early for a date, but there was a reason for this. I had booked us tickets for a Burlesque Cabaret show in London’s Soho at Madame Jojo – a very cool, uber hip club right in the middle of London’s gay scene, and opposite a gay porn store, advertising, in the window, what I guess was the gay porn version of ‘No Country For Old Men’ - ‘No Cunties For Hung Men’. Seriously.

After going to a local pub for a quick drink – and getting some very weird looks being that I was (a) straight, and (b) with a woman, we made our way to the show.

The show itself was ok – a mixture of some very good – one particular model, a Ms Golden Delicious (which I suspect may not have been her real name) was particularly alluring. (www.myspace.com/missgoldendelicious) Some were downright awful, though. There was one group, who I can only assume were there as part of some competition win, who looked like a group of drunken 40-something housewives who had just had Ann Summers throw up on them. That one was particularly painful to watch. Fortunately, the final act were absolutely fantastic – a musical combo who used songs as comedy, changing the arrangements and such.

I was having quite a decent time, perhaps not as decent as I had hoped, but one thing was bugging me. The MC/Compare for the evening was rubbish. But that wasn’t what was pissing me off. It was Sara.

The show was 2 and a half hours, and for 2 and a half hours, Sara had not shut up about how terrible he was. ‘I can’t believe how bad he is’, she would say. ‘He’s so amateurish’ was another. For 2 and a half hours. And, as she polished off her third glass of wine, she was getting a little bit louder with it. Not loud, just loud-er.

And, as we left, it continued. To be honest, I wanted out at that point, but I was bloody starving, and I finally felt like my stomach was ready for proper food. We’d spoken briefly about getting something to eat, and after some very minor persuasion, I was convinced to go and get some Chinese food in Chinatown. Being a Londoner with a working knowledge of where and where not to go, we were safe from food poisoning.

They say the two things you should never talk about on a date are religion and politics. I should have probably written that on my hand at some point. Sara started to ask me about my job, and conversation turned to why we were in the shit as a country, and more questions led to me (quite happily, being that I didn’t want to hear about how the MC/Compare was awful again) explaining my theories on a changing world, the emerging east, and the west’s failure to grasp that it isn’t the dominant political and economic power it once was.

Yeah, things were a laugh riot at this point.

Of course, at this point, I was looking for trouble, and I began to notice things like how horrible her table manners were, how she was rude to the waiters and how she didn’t even OFFER to pay for anything. I mean, I’m fine with paying. I genuinely don’t have a problem, but a false show of willing would be appreciated! Just half-reach for your purse and let me say ‘no, don’t be silly’! But no. The bill came and she just stared at me.

‘Fuck it’ I thought. ‘The sooner I pay, the sooner I can go home’.

We walked through Leicester Square, to get back to the car, which was parked on Saville Row. You’d think we’d reached the low point by this time, but no, the worst was to come.

Set up just outside Leicester Square were some tables, and Sara wanted to see what they were. Apparently, some Scientologists were offering ‘stress tests’, and Sara wanted to do it.

I have a problem with Scientology. It’s obviously a cult, it quite obviously rips people off, and it was started by someone who lived on a boat with a group of 13 year old boys. (He really did)

So we approach, and then, for some inexplicable reason, Sara, in the blink of an eye, had gone from willing partaker to someone whose sole concern was seeing how much she could annoy these people and take the piss out of them, all the time never letting go of my arm, making me an accomplice to this ridiculous charade, and making me look will a willing party.

She then turned and walked away, quite proud of the truly outstandingly bizarre few minutes that had passed, and I just wanted to run. Very fast. Talk, almost inevitably, turned to religion. Sara was happy to offer her opinions on God, religion, and the world, but the moment I offered counter-opinion (and I stress, NOT argument) she immediately dismissed it with a quite literal wave of her hand and an ‘I’m not interested in other people trying to dictate what I think.’

The car ride home was quiet(er) than the hours that had preceded it, and we finally arrived to where she lived. I lied, and told her it was fun, making quite clear that I intended to leave by keeping the engine on.

Now, apparently, I was the only one who didn’t think it went particularly well, because, as I went to kiss Sara goodbye (on the cheek) she turned her head, and tried some disastrous faux-passionate kiss right on my lips. I left them there for a few seconds while I decided the best way to get the fuck out of this without this person chopping me to pieces and keeping my head in her fridge, pulled back, and just said ‘goodnight’, trying my best not to quite literally shove her out of the door.

So yeah, the weekend went well.

Anyway, how are all of you?

Closed Box

It begs the question, to whom does a language belong? With editorials and a load of case studies on people who have chosen this language for their tattoos and why, it makes an interesting read. I'm pleased to say I managed to get into this book with my arabic foot tattoos, which were one of my first.

It is has a nice modern voice and layout, it is an interesting take on something that is currently becoming more and more popular within the tattoo world. It is available from Amazon and would make a great addition to any collection, purely for the interest as well as the fact that it has some pages of designs in there too, for those who are looking for inspiration!

]]> http://contestandco.wordpress.com/?p=30 Mon, 06 Oct 2008 06:25:08 +0000 contest82 http://contestandco.ro.wordpress.com/2008/10/06/link-contest-from-new-look-laser-tattoo-removal/ At New Look they spend a lot of time making sure people in Houston can be well informed about laser tattoo removal. One of the ways they do this is by having people link to their website off of their website or blogs. They are sponsoring a contest that will give away $50 in cold hard cash (or by PayPal, if you prefer). Here’s how it works:

1. All you have to do is link to our main page http://www.NewLookHouston.com with the anchor text of “tattoo removal” and also mention and link to the contest at http://www.NewLookHouston.com/blog in a post on your site.

2. Then email a comment to info [AT] NewLookHouston.com with a link back to the location of the post. You will receive an entry for each link you add from different web sites.

3. A winner will be chosen Wednesday Oct 8 at 5pm with the winner receiving $50 by cash or PayPal
__________________________________________________________________________________________

Su New Look spendono un sacco di tempo per informare le persone a Houston sulla rimozione dei tatuaggi tramite laser. Uno dei modi è cercare di farsi linkare da altri siti o blog.
Stanno quindi sono sponsorizzando un concorso che ha come premio $ 50 in contanti (o con PayPal, se si preferite).
Ecco come funziona:

1. Tutto quello che dovete fare è mettere un link alla homepage http://www.NewLookHouston.com con l'anchor text “tattoo removal” e mettere un link al concorso su http://www.NewLookHouston.com/blog in un post sul tuo sito.

2. Poi manda una e-mail a info [AT] NewLookHouston.com con un link che segnala il tuo post. Riceverai un biglietto per ogni link presente su tuoi siti web.

3. Il vincitore sarà scelto Mercoledì 8 ottobre alle 5pm e riceverà $ 50 in contanti o con PayPal

Fiz minha primeira tatuagem! :)

temple for the spirit that dwells inside it....Tattooing therefore, is a way of

keeping the spiritual and material needs of my body in balance.

  ~Michelle Delio

Today I went with my friend, Cajun Vegan, to initiate her in the world of body art.  Never one to let a friend go through something alone, I thought it only fair that I get a new tattoo as well.  What do you think?

Never mind the tape marks, this butterfly is my newest piece of soul expression.  Butterflies are delicate, fleeting creatures, yet Chaos Theory suggests that something as insignificant as the fluttering of one's wings can alter the course of a tornado hundreds of miles away. Don't we all want to believe we are capable of effecting such significant change through the smallest gestures?

i've actually been cooking up a storm lately. partly due to the fact that adam and i are trying to pinch our pennies, be a little healthier and that yes, i am officially obsessed with tastespotting and foodgawker (which happens to look like tastespotting's little sister). i'm a closet foodie and i admit, a bit of a food porn addict. if i wasn't so lazy i would join the bandwagon, taking luscious shots of my saucy apple dumplings or dazzling pictures of my baked goods, but that will never happen. all though i like to sneak recipes from other fabulous cooks, i like to keep my own recipes to myself. also, i'm not good about keeping my camera with me and though i've never had trouble picking up every other medium, photography has never been my forte'.

actually, by coincidence, i just picked up my camera the other day and found some photos inside that must have been taken... maybe 2 or 3 months ago? who knows! that's how often i use it! i asked adam to bring it down to the gallery with him for first thursday (yet i never actually took any photos. haha). anyway, i turned it on and found some unsuccessful photos of my paintings, a whole slew of photos of my cat and some compromising photos of adam. ok, i'm just kidding... the pictures of adam are completely safe for work.

it cracks me up sometimes when i pick my camera up and find these long lost photos that i've forgotten about. pictures that i thought were uninteresting suddently become... well, i don't know. more interesting?

anyway - here are some of the pictures that happened to be in the camera this time.

this, my friends, is our only child olive. she can be cute sometimes when she's not busy being a total asshole (which is what she is doing the majority of the time). she's our little scavenger, chirper and all around tyrant but she does have her moments of sweetness such as this, where she is laying on our bed. or this one...

and here is what olive is usually like. feel the wrath.

ok. maybe she's not that bad. i think she's just an asshole because she's going through a gender identity crisis. i don't know if i've mentioned it before, but olive is not really a girl. she's a boy. she's a boy that we thought was a girl for a long time. whoops.

unfortunately, i didn't really have any spectacular pictures of adam (which i usually do), but i did happen to snap a picture of his cute face while we were at work. he's obviously working hard (that is a complete and utter lie).

you can also see evidence of the first phase of his tattoo, a birthday present from me. i must admit, i'm a pretty awesome wife and this is the best birthday present i've given him. it's a sweet tattoo, and watching him sit at atlas for 3 hours and getting inked up made me wish i could get a new tattoo myself, which i may very well do. he has to go back in in about 3 weeks to get it filled in, but it looks really nice and i'll have some better pics of it up soon.

so that's it... my little family... and the pictures that get lost in my camera. maybe i'll try to make a point to keep it on me and exploit my food adventures, home adventures and hubby adventures. or maybe not. seriously, i think i'm too lazy for all that.

But to have them in which language - is something that bothers me. Any suggestion? :)

I was up late last night going through the pieces I all ready had for my Halloween costume.

I have no idea how long my feet will last in these but I'm going to try like hell. I'm still not giving away the rest of the costume, it's not like I haven't shown pictures of me in it before though.

I'm seriously considering taking the entire day off. I need a break, and some fun. OK, you talked me into it, I'll take at least the first half of today off. I need some sort of coffee beverage anyway and what better way to waste a morning than to grab a paper and hang out over at TCP.

I've been looking at the stats for this blog, what is with you people and the hits to the fat girl post? Were you expecting more details on how fat girls try harder? Because that's how some have found that post. Yes I know, I know all.

When I was in college I had my tongue pierced. It wasn't for looks. People would catch a glimpse of it and some would just start staring at my mouth and get this twinkle in their eye. The more forward would ask what's that thing for, even though they all ready knew. I've only once had someone grab my face and ask/demand I stick out my tongue.

It's long gone. I rather miss it at times.

I did laugh pretty hard a while back when I heard Chris Rock's stand up piece about them. "If a girl has her tongue pierced she'll probably suck your cock, if a guy has his tongue pierced he'll probably suck your cock."

I might need to change the rating on this blog now. HA! I said cock.

I've had one all consuming thought lately though. I need my next tattoo. I think I'm becoming addicted to the pain. This doesn't bode well for me, at all.

OMG! NO!! i don't really like tattoos and i don't think i like it very much on them either~ and specially Kangin's one, i'm gonna have to ask what "Actions are more Prection than words" is supposed to mean. IDEK! T.T

[googlevideo=http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1025616380836422450]

Recollecting moments
Recalling surface of a face

Floating on the surface of air
The heart remembers..
laughter and tears
sharing of thoughts and hopes
smiles of comfort and touches of emotions

Remembering body and soul
Heart and mind afloat and ready to fall at any moment.

Floatieling was inspired from a Javanese phrase ati eling which means the heart remembers.
Image borrowed from a list of tattoos of the guys from Green Day

It feels fucking orgasmic.

& hell, that's more than I've felt in too long now.

My mother, step father & his mother leave at 3am tomorrow morning for Portugal. I hope they have a wonderful time. Heaven forbid the house will burn down while they're sat on their arses on some beach somewhere, wishing they were in Spain.

My mother & I came to blows this afternoon after she just couldn't stop pushing me about how I felt about them pissing off for two weeks. But that isn't the point, I couldn't care less if they went to the fucking moon for a month. The point is that they've handled it extremely badly & even though I gave them more than enough opportunities, they carried on lying about it to my face.

But alas, they lied & are now pissing off without a care in the world, let alone a care about me & what the hell I'll do. But why am I hurt by this? It's simply another nail in the coffin & only determines my will to cut them off once I am permanently living in America. After all, cutting them out of my life altogether has only been 5 years coming. Yeah. I've been considering this, or more like, I've been on the brink of doing this for five years now & it seems they only want to push me over that edge.

It's been really tense tonight & well, there have been other influences that haven't helped my situation. I want to write about them, I need to write about them but I don't think I can.

All I know is that the noose is pulling tighter & I'm starting to choke. I look at the past six months & wonder, why things aren't any easier....

Why are the urges to tear apart that Bic razor, drag the blade along & down through the layers of my skin until I collapse in an exhausted, blood stained heap stronger than ever?

I was this close to buying the pretty box of individual, wax paper wrapped Exacto blades in the store today.

My impulses are wild as ever & the only way I could stop myself was to reach for handfuls of chocolate bars instead. In-fact I found myself reaching for the alcohol tonight too & they haven't even left yet.

So I don't cut, but I do binge. I binge then I starve myself. Two weeks they'll be gone. That's two weeks where I won't have to lie about haven eaten at work or bother to tuck most of what's on my plate into a tissue when no-ones looking.

Because being 6 months self-injury free really has made me a much saner, happier woman hasn't it?

Give me a fucking break. I'm still as fucked as ever. I simply can't help myself.

Talking of urges, for the past few months my little piercing fanatic side has been niggling me to get another one, only I couldn't decide what. Nothing like getting someone else to hold the blade for you. But maybe that's not true, after all, self injury is incredibly personal & well, it isn't the same thing. Mind you, the past few weeks that same voice has been telling me that a tattoo would be a good idea too.

I don't even know anymore. I barely even feel like trying. I mean, what difference does any of this really make? If it doesn't make a difference to anyone other than me, then only I can decide if what I choose to do is right for me. So in saying that, surely breaking my 6 month streak would be a terribly damaging thing, not only to my healed scars but to my psyche. If I let this go now, everything else will follow. If I push down on this blade now, my entire world will be pushed down with it. Won't it? Or will I bounce back, as though from a respite?

2 weeks without my parents. I'll be at work during the day, but it's at night when my demons come out to play. It's the isolation that will get me & well, that is surely a depressives best friend.

DSC_1883, originally uploaded by The lost photo dude. ]]> http://kopfschlaechter.wordpress.com/2008/10/04/beachtime/ Sat, 04 Oct 2008 15:45:15 +0000 kopfschlaechter http://kopfschlaechter.ro.wordpress.com/2008/10/04/beachtime/

girl15, originally uploaded by vision432. ]]> http://businessclassnyc.wordpress.com/?p=1257 Sat, 04 Oct 2008 14:45:58 +0000 lindabernal http://businessclassnyc.ro.wordpress.com/2008/10/04/lips/

So we all know how important this election is. I've stumbled across a very critical debate over whether Sarah Palin's lipliner is tattooed. All I can say is DSL: Dick Sucking Lips.

Yeah, Stina Nyman is fucking ace.

Super Junior's Kangin and Shindong released pics to show off their new tattoos. Kangin inked himself on the top of his back right under his neck with "I'm Stupid" "Actions are more Precious Prection than words", and Shindong covered his whole upper left arm with a creepy clown and "A friend in need is a friend indeed", which is kind of good since it covers his fat.

Shindong probably got his badass looking tattoo to redeem his manhood that he lost during his Super Junior H days. As for Kangin....I don't even have to try to bash on him. He already embarrassed himself for life by tattooing "prection" on himself, a word that doesn't even exist. Instead of creating wonderfull music to our ears, he should have used that time to study a little more English.

Sleeping in my skin

Bathed in indigo’s tattoo

Steeped in dreams

Of longing

Stained in blue

Sleeping in between

Keeping bay what lies within

Greeting night

Clothed in sorrow

Stained and blue

Darkness find me

Here inside this dress

Wrapped up in your fingers

Come, deliver me

To nights caress

Blanket my loneliness

Cover me in silence

Your invisible embrace

Dark night, deliver me

To forgetfulness

Sleeping in my skin

Slipping into solace

Steeped in dreams

Of sorrow

Stained black on blue

Art or just plain weird? It's the question that has followed artists throughout history, the answer either tags them as revolutionaries or a far less attractive title. But now there is a third alternative- cruel and unnecessary. Wim Delvoye finds himself confronted with the latter. This Fall, he was planning to attend the Shanghai Contemporary Art Fair with his exhibit "Art Farm", the focus of which were two live pigs, shaved and tattoed with the Louis Vuitton logo over their backs. He began the process when they were piglets, and tracked the change in design over the course of their lives.

His exhibit was canceled at the last minute, even though buyers for the pigs had flown in from all over the world, apparently even from America. If all went as planned, the pigs would be bought and slaughtered, their skins to be made into anything the owner fancied. The farm where Delvoye kept the pigs is located in China, where animal rights are some of the worst in the world- some would argue even non-existent. Can you imagine if he tried that stuff here?

Many people, PETA in particular, have reacted with alarm. But several fashion and design magazines have included his work in their pages, lauding his work as a "critique on mass consumerism".

Um...tattooing pigs, then selling them to the highest bidder to be slaughtered and auctioned off for upwards of 10, 000 Pounds is not a critique. It's a very cushy paycheck. Oh, yeah, and the branded future "product" will only be another link in the chain of consumerism. Read: rich businessman buys aforementioned Louis Vuitton skin for trophy wife to create the ultimate LV handbag; the brand is already on the leather- how original! Let's start a trend and buy some more. Or not- because it's exclusive, bitches.*

I'm usually a very open-minded person, especially when it comes to the arts. I detest the person who says they "know art" or those who put restrictions and limitations on it. People didn't think Dadaism was art, but is now seen as a key art movement in both art and social history. But Delvoye really pushes some buttons. Mainly the hypocrite one. Because that's what he is.

A critique on our consumerism? Really, Wim? Or is it an extreme measure meant to get publicity and make some cold hard cash on your part? I'm sure he had some sort of creative idea behind it, because when you think about it, pigs haven't ever been tatted with a brand name before. But just because something doesn't have a page in the book of art history (yet), don't make it art. Also, call me crazy, but I think tattooing would be painful, and inflicting that unnecessarily on animals is cruel. And, well, unnecessary.

Lesson learned: Think twice when you're forced to enact your art in China, because your home country deems it illegal.

*Please excuse over-drawn rant on consumerism. I am in no way a counter-culturalist or anti-consumerist, and my frequent Holt Renfrew visits/ visa bill can attest to that. But when I sniff out a hypocrite, I have to lay the smack down, and that includes my train of thought.