SCARWARS

Accolades are a weird thing. When I was considering creating an award in Keith Alexander’s honor for the second SW event, I threw out a bunch of names to the artists who I respect; asking them who they thought really changed the culture of scarification.

A similar list of names came up; each artists bringing up the people they were inspired by. It formed a pretty clear picture of the previous two decades of Scarring; Raelyn and Fakir, Steve Haworth and Blair… every list had a few of the same folks.. but only one name was on all of them.

Ron Garza.

I met Ronnie for the first time back in 1995 or so; virtually. He was already a character and laid claim to a burgeoning legend; some of which I’m sure he’d rather forget. But the constant back then was him sending me pictures of the cuttings he was doing. Very ‘ahead of it’s time’ stuff, Ron was using tattoo iconography as a basis for large scale cuttings. In 1995 the prevailing design aesthetic for cutting and branding was mainly ‘tribal’ or ethnographic, fraternity designs or geometrical stuff.

Ron took Chicano tattoo designs and laid them in with scalpel. Some of his early work really got my mind churning for what could be possible with scarification and along with Keith’s passion for it leeching into my brain, pretty much steered me on to the path that created the SW events.

With that in mind, we presented Ron with the first (and currently, only) ‘KEITH ALEXANDER AWARD FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF THE ART AND CULTURE OF SCARIFICATION’ in 2006.

He’s spent most of his life traveling, piercing, tattooing, cutting and suspending and continues to be a valued presence in my life.

Ron sent in a new cutting this morning; a shaded rose piece on a client from Ohio. The shading stuff looks so awesome when it’s healed. I’ll bug Ron to bug the client to keep us updated.

He’ll be guesting in Seattle March 8th – 14th and is taking appointments now: RonGarza.com for contact info.

More new old SW photos!
I love finding discs I had forgotten about; these were taken by my good friend and consigliere Brian Sowden. There are hundreds on the disc from the first and second events. SO many of our guests took pictures, and so FEW ever sent me discs of their images (that’s guilt-tripping, people… it’s never too late) but it’s always nice to see an event from another person’s perspective.

This shot features Dave Gillstrap, Ron Garza (back to the camera), Jesse Villemaire (on crutches), Johannes (aka Jo-hotness) Sammi (back to the camera) and in the distance Ryan Ouellette and Brian Decker cutting the first two pieces of the event at SW1.

Aaaaand they’re in!
After some delays (you know who you are) the Fall/Winter book is finally in. I’m still waiting on the shirts, but rest assured that they’re going to be badass.

Eventually there will be a massive full sized (and maybe an oversized) SW book. I have so many images to choose from that I find myself constantly revising and reediting the book in it’s current state… I’m eventually going to bring in a co-editor who’s not so emotionally attached to the images and who will kick my ass into gear and get you guys a finished product. Eventually.

Until then, thanks so much to the folks who picked this version up!

I’ve known Ron Garza going on 15 years now; he was one of the first guys (with Steve Haworth, Keith Alexander and Blair) who got me really excited about the potential of cutting/branding. He’s also a damn fine piercer; one of the few that I’d make an off topic posting for here on the ol’ Scarblog.

So here’s the posting.

Garz and my buddy Chris Glunt just started shipping out their much anticipated “Professional Piercing Basics Vol 1″ dvd.

The limited edition pressing is available through Ron’s website.

“This DVD explains needle bending, palming vs pouching techniques, added safety measures for freehanding piercings,, explanation to understanding needle bevels, as well as marking and piercing of most above the neck piercings as well a few ways of doing each piercing, AND MUCH MORE!!! . More than 74 mins and over 25 piercing videos with SO much new information!!!”

If you mention SCARWARS with your order, Ron or Chris will draw you a monkey on a cocktail napkin.

Due to issues with Ron’s website, I’ve included the information after the break.

Ron at SW2, Photo by Atom Moore.

I just got word that my friend Ron Garza is heading over to Europe for a Scarification/Speaking tour. Ron and I go back fifteen years or so; I’ve known him as a piercer, scarification artist, suspension practitioner, tattooist and most of all, stand-up guy and a good friend. If you have a chance to catch up with Ron on his tour, make sure to buy him a glass of wine!

Speaking: WOD (Wings of Desire) SusCon Oslo , Norway July 25th & 26th.

Cutting/Branding: July 30th- August 7th
SWEDEN: Stockholm.
DENMARK: Malmoe & Copenhagen.
Soon: UK , GERMANY, AUSTRIA and more to be announced.

Anyone interested in scarification or branding make appointment with Ron as soon as possible.
IAM.BMEZINE- Sicklove.
WEB: RonGarza.com

Brian Decker and Ron Garza teamed up at SW2 on the West Coast to do a large-scale Ganesha cutting.

And finished!
Photo c.2007 Rachel Zimmerman/Scarwars