ERIKONDA

In the default world, I'm a tattoo artist based in Los Angeles. I've known Rommel & LiLU since1998 or so and have tattooed both of them. I hope to do more tattoos on our wonderful kamp mates too! They tried talking me into coming to Burning Man for about 6 years before they got me out there in 2004 for the first time. Within the first ten minutes on the playa I said, "what the fuck took me six years to get out here?" Since then, I've fallen in love with my playa family and the kamp and I'll be attending Burning Man as many times as I can from now on.

On the playa, I love lounging and napping during the hot part of the day, but you can usually see me out and about shooting photos the rest of the time. I love mixing koktails for the kamp, riding art cars, shooting night photos and taking playa showers especially right after being in the one man sauna (that people keep shitting in) or a 60 mph dust storm/group pole dance.

My playa personae is Willowdean Handy. She was a woman who accompanied her husband, Edward Handy, when he was commissioned by the Bishop Museum in Honolulu to do an ethnology report on the Marquesas islanders. Since their population had decreased almost 80% within a span of fifty years, due to tuberculosis and random sexually transmitted diseases introduced by Europeans and Americans, it was thought at the time that this entire race of people would die out. Willowdean and Edward set out from the East Coast of the US to The Marquesas islands in 1920, arriving eight months later in 1921. They lived in a kind of "survival mode" in the Marquesas for nearly two years studying and photographing over a hundred people and their tattoos. The original assignment had nothing to do with the tattooing, but she was intrigued by their beauty and special meanings, so this became her personal project which she shared with the Bishop Museum and with the world.

During their time, Willowdean compiled the first ever report of original ancient Marquesas tattoos. Long thought by many to be a man, she was in fact a woman who also wrote several other books on the Marquesas and Australia. One book was written from memory 44 years after her visit to the Marquesas. This book is called "Forever the Land of Men" which is a direct translation of the name the Marquesans called their islands before some guy from Spain came over in the 1500's and named the islands after the wife of some Spanish nobleman.

Willowdean was so touched by the native islander's way of life, culture and especially their tattoos, that she documented them with love and respect (something not commonly practiced during those years toward "natives" of any sort). She is a heroine in the Polynesian tattoo community as her book, "Tattooing in the Marquesas" is one of only two documentations of the artform that does not demoralize their beauty, significance, and magical meanings. At the time she worked on documenting these tattoos, the art of tattooing was banned from being practiced, and the natives were made to feel ashamed of their body art. Through her fascination with their tattoos, she gave many native people a pride they once lost in their culture, religion and selves.

See you at the burn!

~Erikonda

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