We hope you enjoyed our (primarily) tongue-in-cheek post of 1 April 2016 (see below). Although there may not be much mileage in topics such as 'Pushing the Boundaries: Expanding Waistlines and the Tattoo', nor are we currently planning a conference for 2017, we are delighted with the responses we received (some cheeky, some serious).

We do also want to emphasize that Print Quarterly welcomes submissions based on a broad understanding of what constitutes printmaking and those arts that draw from it. The relationship between tattoos and printmaking might indeed be a viable area of enquiry. Moreover, Print Quarterly is open to artistic traditions throughout the world.

Posted 1 April 2016, Print Quarterly Call for Papers: Call for Papers: The Skin as Matrix Conference

Squarely sited at the intersection of art and life, engraving on human skin – tattoos – has recently emerged as an engrossing object of investigation (see 'Paper like Skin', Print Quarterly, March 2014, pp. 83–84 and skin as matrix, Print Quarterly, March 2012, p. 84, fig. 76).

Following in the footsteps of museums interpreting the material through exhibitions such as 'Engraving Prestige: Hand Tattoo of Paiwan', Print Quarterly intends to fully engage, hosting a conference in 2017 that aims to act as a crucial interpolation in the ongoing dialogue between tattoos and aesthetic studies, envisaged here in an historical and transcultural perspective from the earliest known human artistic manifestations to the present day. 

Outstanding papers will be considered for publication in the Journal. 

We would welcome any kind of contextualized approach that permeates frontiers and proposes to analyse the various practices through which this art form is constructed and contested and look forward to exploring the dynamic nature of this discursive field.

Proposed themes for consideration:

  • The Significance of the Tattoo from Prehistory to Angelina Jolie
  • European Tattoos: Sources and Meaning
  • Wim Delvoye's Pigs: 1997 to today
  • A Wrinkle in Time: Issues of Conservation in Tattoo-engravings
  • The Well-Tanned Matrix
  • Pushing the Boundaries: Expanding Waistlines and the Tattoo
  • The Posthumous States

Conference Date and Place:

1 April 2017 
at 10 Chester Row 
London SW1W 9JH 

Please submit abstracts and images (no originals please!) to editor@[at]printquarterly.co.uk by 31 June 2016.