B.O.R. is a ritualistic post-tattoo practice started by Michele Servadio in 2014.
B.O.R. is a contemporary ritual where tattooing turns into sound.
B.O.R. is a sonified and amplified tattoo.
B.O.R. is a technique of subjective reconfiguration through pain, sound and a permanent mark on the body.
B.O.R. is a ritualistic tattoo practice, deviating from the normal tattoo shop, translating into a sign a process that takes place along several frequencies, manifesting itself in many dimensions.
This is the beginning of the book that includes four years of Body of Reverbs. An installation that unites sound and tattoos in one vibrant experience. The practice is research on the connection between space, body and sound. The tattoo machine is a real musical instrument that translates the vibrations of the needle on the skin into a sound. The pain felt during the performance is amplified through the space and the result is unreal. Servadio, an Italian artist and tattooer based in London, is the mind behind this project.
Giacomo Streliotto
The first publication of Servadio‘s ritualistic tattooing consists in a gatefold containing an LP with the recordings of two sessions performed during the first installation in Hackney Wick, London in 2016 with Years of Denial and Hexn, and a book with contributions by Alex Binnie, Betty Marenko, Caro Ley, Riccardo Balli, Steve Hopkins, Sofia Sacchetti, Piera Talin and Michela Zucca. A visual and theoretical support in order to properly collocate this practice within the contemporary culture.
Luke Hallett
“It seems fitting that Michele Servadio has based himself in Hackney, stomping ground of 70’s industrial gods Throbbing Gristle”, Alex Binnie (Tattooer & Printmaker) says. “Since then most of London, and indeed the Western World, seems more sanitized and commercial. Tattooing included. Body of reverbs takes tattooing back to it’s scary, primal roots. These Aktions speak of a Neolithic past, dark and violent. Sacrificial bodies in a cave of doom, noise and pain in cathartic crescendo – Long live the new flesh!”.
Michele Servadio
“Tattooing in the 2000s is gentrifying at a greater speed than high streets”, Huffington Post’s editor Steve Hopkins agrees. “A mass-market product so common, the next generation will likely reject it as un-cool. It’s big- tobacco. It’s Coca-Cola. It’s a pharmaceutical sized-phenomenon so obese it’s lost all its colours. It’s infected kids’ faces. It’s full suits without a single image. It’s beyond saturation. It’s a blackout. Body of Reverbs transcends all that. It’s polymorphic. And it might just save tattooing.”
Giacomo Streliotto
The book is a beautiful collection of moments and memories that smells of blood and pain. If you read it listening to the vinyl, the result is utterly disturbing. You can figure yourself with your naked skin lied down on the table. You can feel the needle scratching and an endless agony spreading in your body. You can hear the sound of your torment deeply in your guts. Body of Reverbs reveals an intimate, physical, mental and energetic awareness. Servadio is the creator of a unique and incredible experience.
Out on September 7th.
