The Japanese Tattoo [Paperback]

Sandi Fellman (Author, Photographer), D. M. Thomas (Introduction)

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

American photographer Sandi Fellman used a rare large size Polaroid camera to create these photos of Irezumi Japanese men and women who wear elaborate full-body tattoos. Fellman treats the tattoos as artworks and their creators as artists. Her text touches on the tattooing process, common motifs, the sociology of the tattoo, and relationships between the tattoo masters and their clients. Author D.M. Thomas has contributed two pages of his reactions to these unusual and even disturbing images. The 46 color plates in this volume, most of them whole body nudes, should prove provocative, fascinating, or repellant to a wide variety of library patrons. Kathryn W. Finkelstein, M.L.S., Cincinnati
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Paperback: 120 pages
• Publisher: Abbeville Press (December 2, 1987)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0896597989
• ISBN-13: 978-0896597983
• Product Dimensions: 12 x 9.9 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (27 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #132,736 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

27 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Great Photos, Weak Text, August 23, 2005

By 

K Fulbeck - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Japanese Tattoo (Paperback)

If you have no experience with horimono, this book gives some excellent images focusing mostly on the works of three masters (only one, Horiyoshi III Sensei of Yokohama still actively tattoos). The book is worth buying for the images alone.

And I wish it were the images alone. The captions are often naive, bordering at times on offensive. The author at best over-exotifies and at worse verges on ridiculing some of her subjects, and seems to know very little about the tradition, history, and mores of Japanese society and horimono. Add to that an introduction that is almost unexplainably ludicrous (by an author with no bio!) and you have a book that's great to look at, just not to read. I'd give it 5 stars if it was just the photos.

Read Takahiro Kitamura's books as well as Donald Richie's for better information.

21 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars You never saw Polaroids like this!, August 13, 2001

By 

Rae Schwarz "post-modern Renaissance woman" (Seattle, WA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Japanese Tattoo (Paperback)

Imagine life-size Polaroid photographs. Imagine traditional, Japanese, full-body tattooing. Imagine a book of life-size Polaroids taken of traditional, full-body, Japanese tattoos.... this IS that book! Sandi Fellman got the proper introductions and a great toy (a Polaroid that really takes life-size plates) when she went to Japan and set out to document the hidden world of the irezumi, the tattoo underground. This collection is almost all traditional hand-executed tattooing. The details are unparallelled, and you get to see all kinds of shading you might not notice at a distance. This type of body modification still is a secret, private practice in Japan and to view images of this quality is rare.

20 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars excellent (would deserve 5 stars - without the introduction), January 12, 2000

By 

robert wild (switzerland) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Japanese Tattoo (Paperback)

are you interested in japanese tattoos? yes? then this book is definitely for you! the photographs are great. and the tattoos on display are all done by some of the greatest japanese tattoo masters. the introduction i found rather bad; very artsy fartsy. but it's only a bit more than a page long. so don't worry. the complementary text sandi fellman has written i haven't even read yet - i've been way too busy looking over and over again at the tattoos. again: if you're into tattoos and/or japanese tattoos you simply have to buy this book!