> During a trip to the United States, Dr Masaichi brought along some of his prized tattooed skins in a suitcase. In a bizarre twist of fate, the suitcase was stolen while he was in Chicago. The fate of those tattooed skins remains a mystery to this day, with the thief likely unaware of the unique—and eerie—contents of the suitcase.
Imagine stealing a suitcase only to find it filled with tattooed human skin. Yikes.
I came to see if anyone else has made that connection. I wonder if he saw this and it was an inspiration? Hard to know because he could quite as easily imagined it.
To me, the photos of the skin "splayed" in a large frame feel highly disturbing.
While the photo of the skin wrapped onto a mannequin seems not just entirely tasteful, but beautiful even.
It's the same thing, but preserving the shape of the human body somehow makes it feel so much more respectful. I never would have guessed that would make any difference, since I'm aware of it being the same cadaver skin in both cases.
My partner and I listen to a podcast about tattoos and history called Beneath the Skin on long drives. One of the hosts, Matt Lodder has made a career studying tattooing. As an outsider I didn't expect it to be as interesting as it is and they provide an interesting look at people and history.
My god I’m aware that for people who work with dead people all the time this may be less shocking but just ripping off the biggest organ off a dead person seems like it’s in rather poor taste IMO
> During a trip to the United States, Dr Masaichi brought along some of his prized tattooed skins in a suitcase. In a bizarre twist of fate, the suitcase was stolen while he was in Chicago. The fate of those tattooed skins remains a mystery to this day, with the thief likely unaware of the unique—and eerie—contents of the suitcase.
Imagine stealing a suitcase only to find it filled with tattooed human skin. Yikes.
Trying to find a fence for human skin would hard although, given humanity, I imagine not impossible.
Just go to Darcin Cole with some blood from Adalon.
The pics are enough, something very unnerving about flayed human skin.
I’m not doubting the veracity of the story, but it reminded me of the “dog in suitcase” urban legend¹.
Maybe the robber this time was Buffalo Bill². In which case, jackpot.
¹ https://www.vice.com/en/article/dead-dog-suitcase-stolen-tub...
² The Silence of the Lambs character, James Gumb³, not the showman William F. Cody⁴.
³ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buffalo_Bill_(The_Silence_of_t...
⁴ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buffalo_Bill
This reminds me of story “Skin” by Roald Dahl
https://artinfiction.wordpress.com/2013/09/04/roald-dahl-ski...
It's very Roald Dahl. Great tale
I came to see if anyone else has made that connection. I wonder if he saw this and it was an inspiration? Hard to know because he could quite as easily imagined it.
To me, the photos of the skin "splayed" in a large frame feel highly disturbing.
While the photo of the skin wrapped onto a mannequin seems not just entirely tasteful, but beautiful even.
It's the same thing, but preserving the shape of the human body somehow makes it feel so much more respectful. I never would have guessed that would make any difference, since I'm aware of it being the same cadaver skin in both cases.
My partner and I listen to a podcast about tattoos and history called Beneath the Skin on long drives. One of the hosts, Matt Lodder has made a career studying tattooing. As an outsider I didn't expect it to be as interesting as it is and they provide an interesting look at people and history.
His book: https://harpercollins.co.uk/products/painted-people-humanity...
The article mentions he has two methods of preserving. Wet and dry. But then only explains the dry one. :/
How does the wet preservation work?
I also found that very frustrating. It's probably the method required to stretch the skin over a tailor's dummy like in that one photo.
Goo, they keep it in goo
That's what I was wondering. Floating in formaldehyde...
I've reached the weird part of the Internet, it seems.
Not as weird as https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Issei_Sagawa
Ugh, that was disturbing to read…
Like something out of Gotham.
My god I’m aware that for people who work with dead people all the time this may be less shocking but just ripping off the biggest organ off a dead person seems like it’s in rather poor taste IMO
How old are his, ehm, potential collections when they made the deal?
I can't imagine him making a deal with some 20-somethings and waiting 60 years to reap the fruit.
Or maybe he "accelerated" the process?
To be fair, being a lifetime gangster tends to be bad for your life expectancy.
There's a movie about it Louis De Funes played in