For at least five thousand years, humans have used tattoos to permanently modify their appearance. Tattoos—inked designs embedded in the skin—function as markers of both belonging and exclusion. In Ancient Greek, the word for tattooed mark or puncture is stigma, and the meaning of the word in contemporary English (a mark of disgrace, a setting apart) remains pertinent today. Steeped in taboo, tattoos have visually read as markers of otherness since the early modern Euro-American colonization of the medium.

Though tattooed markings have proliferated in human culture for millennia, their perception and acceptability depend upon the wearer’s culture and public identity. When people experience marginalization or ostracization from the dominant society, many choose tattoos to establish agency over their otherness. Paradoxically, this visual expression of individuality forms collective identity within subcultures, melding together ideas of otherness and togetherness. Tattoos and tattoo culture have also captured the attention of visual artists who engage with the tension between mainstream and outsider, and normative and othered bodies.

Despite stigmatization surrounding tattoos, people continue to inscribe identity upon their bodies. Today, tattoos are no longer solely a feature of subculture; the mainstream’s adoption of this art form signals an interest in bold forms of self-expression, and only the most extreme tattoos still signal a departure from normativity.

Inked: stigma, otherness, and art is an online exhibition presenting photography, prints, and drawings that celebrate tattooing’s expansive artistic tradition while exploring its longstanding association with subcultures, including queer communities, prison culture, and other forms of cultural otherness.