Throughout history, we can find several examples of tattoos and graffiti, artistic expressions which are, in their essence, associated with counterculture and challenging social norms. For a long time both have been connected with marginalization, however, recently, they have been appropriated and accepted by privileged groups. And yet, their value is still questioned when tied to a black body.
In Corpus is a photography book being made with direct contact with a community of black taggers, graffiti and tattoo artists, and tattooed individuals. It is through this direct exchange, with encounters and interviews, that this book is born. After all, one's account is, by nature, a reflection of their collective.
From the Latin "on the body," the name itself is meaningful since the body is the protagonist of the work. Not just our own human and black body and the way it is viewed by others, but also the urban body, where the collective resides, public spaces that historically have been built to exclude minorities. We live in a society that was erected in a way that delivers art and culture as a commodity to the privileged and those without the same conditions, despite social and political resistance, still need to fight to escape the monotony of a silent urban dialogue.
Nonetheless, it is a fact that the city is where we can find social possibilities. It's in it that the tattoo and the graffiti expand, and it's the contact with them that In Corpus intends to shine a light on. The project explores the potency of these art forms and their effect on black lives; the transformation of the collective and personal experiences.
Ultimately, they are art forms that, above all, converse with transformation; the tattoo, as a strong form of empowering, appropriates and celebrates your own body, and the graffiti, that allows everyone to express themselves and consume art in their daily lives, disrupts the dirt of the city with color and protest.
