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The Mark of Cain: the Russian criminal tattoos (I)
The Mark of Cain documents the fading art form and the Russian criminal tattoos, once a taboo subject in Russia. The virtual disappearance is now seen as a reflection of the transition of Russian society in general. Filmed in some of the most notorious prisons in Russia, including the famous White Swan, interviews with prisoners, guards, and criminologists show the secret language of the area and the Code Stalinist Gulag inmates, or the area, as it is called, has developed a complex social structure (documented in the decade of 1920) that incorporated highly symbolic tattooing as a mark of rank. The existence of these inmates in prisons and labor camps was considered by the state as a closely guarded secret. In the 1990s, the population of Russia broke jail overcrowding among the worst in the world. Some estimates suggest that in the last generation of over thirty million of Russia’s inmates have had tattoos, but the process is illegal in Russian prisons. The Mark of Cain...
Tattoos 46
As we enter the second decade of the 21st Century we can look back at all the technological, social and medical advancements made in the last 10 years. For those who suffer from tattoo regret one area of advancement that they can thank medical science and ingenuity for is new and improved ways to lower the cost of tattoo removal. Tattoos have been around since man first learned how to control and use fire to improve the human condition on Earth, but it wasn't until the last century that forms of tattoo removal began to make great strides in effectiveness without leaving severe scar tissue. Prior to the late 20th Century, to endure a tattoo removal procedure a person had to endure a process that could be painful and only partially effective. As tattoos became the fashion in the 1990's more time, effort and money was devoted to finding new methods and refining and improving the methods that were already in existence. Along with an increase in the popularity of tattoos there devel...