Tattoo Artists Tracing Tribal Traditions and Ancestral Cultures from Mentawai and Borneo

Exhibition Details: The existing academic literature often discusses tattoo artists as either members of counter-culture or suppliers of popular culture consumption. Little has been said about their cultural-political role. This exhibition offers a counter-voice to some Euro-Anglo scholarly literature that deems the efforts of tattoo artists in tribal tattoo revivals as a form of meaningless popular culture. It highlights the cultural agency of the contemporary tattoo artists in Indonesia, Malaysia and beyond as they aspire to protect Mentawai and Dayak (i.e., indigenous Bornean) cultural heritage. Our exhibition and visual dialogue therefore transcend the walls of the academe.

Tattooing has historically been a sacred practice innate to the social fabric and spirituality of indigenous communities across the world, but many tribal tattoo traditions have been appropriated, changed, or pushed to the verge of extinction. The tattoo designs and handtapping tattoo techniques from Mentawai and Borneo were almost lost entirely because of European imperialism, religious taboos around body modification and the Petrus Killings under President Suharto’s ‘New Order’ (1967-1998) – all leading towards the negative stigmatisation of tattoos. Today, however, one can observe a movement of contemporary tattoo artists aspiring to protect, preserve and promote the intangible cultural heritage of Mentawai tribes and Dayak tribes, especially their tattoo traditions. Despite the growing popularity of tattoos in Indonesia’s underground communities, the stigmatisation of tattoos as criminal, unprofessional, and ‘primitive’ perseveres. This means that this movement of ‘traditional tattoo’ artists can – or should – be understood at the nexus of power/resistance in Indonesian politics of culture and of the body. These artists do not only carry on the Mentawaian and Bornean tattoo traditions through tattooing, but they also pursue independent research expeditions to Mentawai and Borneo, make documentaries, give educative talks and engage in other activist/artivist activities. This exhibition is therefore most fitting within the ICAS13 theme 6 “Using the Arts, Media, and Culture: Contestations and Collaborations”.

This research-based exhibition is a collaborative project between an independent photographer who travelled the jungle of Siberut/Mentawai several times, and an academic student researcher who combines critical ethnographic fieldwork from August 2023 to July 2024 with photography and secondary literature research. The portraits displayed below were captured during the Borneo Handtapping Tattoo Weekend 2023 in district Bau near Kuching, Sarawak, Borneo, involving exclusively tattoo handworkers and handtappers from Indonesia, Malaysia, and beyond. As a side note, it is important to explain that handtapping tattoos with a wooden stick and a needle attached to another wooden stick is the tribal tattoo technique from Mentawai and Borneo. The tattoo artists were photographed whilst taking a break from tattooing during this event. The effect is a raw, unfiltered aesthetic that opens up space for the affective – a possible sense of being, interbeing, and understanding between the traditional tattoo ‘artivist’ and the exhibition audience. It is important to note that whilst this exhibition focuses on the artists engaging with the Mentawai and Bornean tattoo traditions, such tattoo revival movements can be found elsewhere such as Papua, Kalinga/Philippines, Melanesian or Polynesian tattooing. The negative stigmatization of traditional tattoos – also known as ‘tribal tattoos’ – can have various reasons for every local context is unique, but a common denominator is that traditional tattoos remain taboo in many spaces in the world. The movement of tattoo artists turning to indigenous tattoo traditions can therefore be pinpointed in Indonesia but it extends beyond the Indonesian Archipelago and Malaysia. In that sense, this exhibition reveals the tip of the veil of traditional/tribal tattoo revivals in the contemporary world.

A short description of the eight selected portraits of the exhibition. To begin with Tipung Puyang, a female traditional tattoo artist from Sabah, Malaysia, researches and practises female traditional tattoo cultures from all over Southeast Asia. She handtaps tattoos relating exclusively to the tattoo traditions of the Kenyah and Kayan tribes from Borneo, which only consider the female gender as legitimate for being a tattoo artist. She has thus far been the only Bornean role model who attempts to carry on the Kenyah and Kayan tattoo traditions as a woman. Second, Letcu Sipatiti is an indigenous male tattoo artist from North Siberut, Mentawai, who engages in deep ancestral art research in Siberut Island and who exclusively practises the handtapping tattoo technique and designs from Mentawai. Third, Arth Akal is a male traditional tattoo artist from Miri, Sarawak, Malaysia who studies the Dayak tattoo traditions in Sarawak and Kalimantan. His tattoo work comprises both handtapping and machine tattooing, but it is dedicated to Dayak tattoo designs. Fourth, Meraki Fade is a female tattoo artist from the United Kingdom who self-identifies as a tattoo researcher and an anthropologist as she collects knowledge and artefacts for her newly opened Traditional Tattoo Museum in Brighton. She has made expeditions to Mentawai and Borneo to study the local tattoo traditions and cultures. Fifth, Aman Durga Sipatiti is a male traditional tattoo artist who was born in Jakarta but has lived the larger part of his life in Yogyakarta, Berlin and Los Angeles. Already in 2009, Durga was actively studying Mentawai tattoo traditions focusing on handtapping tattoos, making documentaries in Mentawai, giving interviews for magazines, and so on. Up to this day, Durga remains a senior advocate for the tattoo traditions of Mentawai, Kayan, Iban, Ngaju, Kenyah, Punan and other indigenous tribes in the Indonesian Archipelago, which he preserves through his tattoo art. Sixth, Uncle Gondrong is a young male tattoo artist from Pontianak, Kalimantan, who is based in Yogyakarta. He aspires to continue the traditional tattoo traditions of his Bornean ancestors. Seventh, David Kalalo is an Indonesian male tattoo artist who settled down in The Hague, the Netherlands. He combines the traditional tattoo designs and patterns originating from the Indonesian Archipelago by using an electric tattoo machine as well as handpoke instruments. Eighth, Riky Yonda is a male tattoo artist from Kalimantan who focuses on ancestral research within and about Kalimantan, Borneo.

A final note on social impact. Though the tattoo industry remains male-dominated, the role of female tattoo artists should not be left unnoticed. Female tattoo artists such as Tipung Puyang and Meraki Fade are a minority group in the tattoo industry. For this reason, academic attention to their work and the selection of their portraits are relevant for reasons of diversity and inclusion. Within this context, it can be argued that the selection of portraits for this exhibition is diverse in terms of gender, age (i.e., young adults and senior artists), background and origin. Moreover, the independent research undertaken by these tattoo artists must not be overlooked. They find patterns, and commonalities but also relevant differences between various tribes in Mentawai and Borneo. These patterns are a vivid display of the belief systems of various indigenous people; belief systems and stories of origin that are precious and need to be protected, lest they go completely extinct in the age of modernity, globalisation and industry. The portraits connect a human face to the name of the tattoo artivist’s story about contemporary revivals of traditional tattoo designs and techniques.