Personal Adornment

I have never considered my personal adornment art in any form of the word. The only expressive body art I have is a tattoo on my inner upper arm, but I have always been fascinated with body art. Tattoos, piercings, clothing, or any other form of body modification attract my attention, and i find it hard to look away when I see a guy/girl with a full sleeve tattoo. While some people consider tattoos and piercings as marks symbolizing mislead youth, I find it expressive and mesmerizing. I have never considered turning my body into a work of art mostly because i can hear my mom yelling at me about how I will never get a job with all those tattoos. It sounds kind of wierd to say, but I admire those people that have full sleeves or a tattoo that covers their whole back because of the pain and commitment they go through. Today in lecture I heard that body modification symbolizes a right of passage and also represents becoming a man or a women. It is easy to come up with examples of body art symbolizing rights of passage in nonwestern or ancient societies, but today teenagers rebel from their parents by piercing or tattooing their body to represent coming into their ownself and breaking away from being their parent's child.
As i stated above I have always had this fascination with tattoos and couldn't wait for the day I would get one. I would consider my mother pretty old fashioned when it comes to body art. What i mean by old fashioned is she hates tattoos and doesn't want her son covered in ink the rest of his life. I got my tattoo over christmas break sophmore year in college. It is of an angel that represents my guardian. My mother was very reluctant about the whole situation, but ended up ok about what I got. What surprised me was how eager I was to get another one. I thought that some people view tattoos as works of art that are inspiring or beautiful, and some become addicted to the feeling tattoos give them. I consider myself to have an addictive personality and if it wasn't for my parents I would easily have four to five tattoos. It made me realize that some tattoos are done in the name of art, and people get tatoos or other forms of body art for a whole different reason, whether it be painful pleasure or an addiction. While I do not value art nor am an artistic person, I am able to make a connection with tattoos in a totally different way.