New film shines light on underground South Korean tattoo culture

For the past 33 years, tattooing in South Korea by anyone other than a medical professional was punishable by law. This was established by a 1992 Supreme Court ruling, which stated that only medical professionals could insert needles into the body.

But that didn’t erase tattoo culture, or force the art form to disappear. For years, hundreds of thousands of tattoo artists, operating underground, risked up to five years in jail or fines of about up to 50 million Korean won, or 30,000 euros.

Tattoos remained relatively commonplace, especially as they gained popularity on social media, but the cost, legal and social, remained high.

As of 2021, there were an estimated 350,000 tattoo artists in the country, according to the Ministry of Health and Welfare. Among these, many operated strictly underground and had no medical qualifications.

At once a form of defiance and an act of expression, tattooing became an underground community of its own, a hidden world where artists could share their fears, dreams, and most importantly, their art, with one another .

'Angels', a documentary by Hicham Touili-Idrissi and Nancy-Wang Musisá, put the secret lives of South Korean tattoo artists on full display, as they worked in the shadows in the name of their art. It tells the stories of those who dared to defy the stigma, and the law, and who eventually campaigned for their country to recognise their work.

The title of the film exemplifies its message, which directly contradicts the stigma faced by tattoo artists and the tattooed alike in South Korea. It follows the story of Pie Boy, a young, tattooed man, who, as per the director “shared with me that his goal in life was to be kind to every single person he encounters, in order to show that ‘you can have tattoos all over your face yet still be an angel”’.

Through their work, Touili-Idrissi and Musisá aimed to capture a portrait of the lives of “this community of artists who wish to make the world more beautiful, yet who can still be vilified and ostracized”. All of the tattoo artists in the documentary have tattooed Pie Boy, the heart and subject of the film.

“These friends are angels to me, they are makers of good and beauty,” says Touili-Idrissi.

Tattoo artists in South Korea are often met with financial instability.

“I try to have confidence in myself, with nothing to hide, that’s my personality. But because there are no laws protecting tattoo artists in Korea, I do not feel secure. When I think about my life and my future, my biggest problem is instability,” Gui He, one of the tattoo artists featured in the documentary says of her work.

More than that, they risk social stigma, including from their families. Tattoos in South Korea are often associated with medical risks or gang activity. In Korea, China, and Japan, criminals were once punished by having their faces tattooed, a stigma that continues into the modern day.

“On social stigma, South Korean society is very divided by age, with the younger generation on the one side which is very interested in tattoo culture, and the elders who can only think of gangs. We also cannot undermine the image of the Japanese “yakuzas”, which has been very present in South Korea due to occupation,” says Touili-Idrissi, who consulted with Hwa Pyung Yoo, a South Korean PhD student and researcher at Harvard University, while researching his work.

“Sometimes it frustrates me, being tattooed. I lived with my grandmother when I was younger, and when I passed by my neighbourhood, the older people looked at me. They looked at me, saw the tattoo on my face, and became worried,” says Héin, a second tattoo artist who appears in the documentary.

“Those were old women, like my grandmother.”

Following lengthy campaigns, including by a tattooist’s union, the law finally changed in September, bringing an end to the instability faced by people in the sector. Non-medical professionals, who make up the vast majority of the sector, will now be able to be licensed and gain formal recognition for their work.

“We are talking about an estimate of 350,000 tattoo workers who were not fully able to benefit from social security, retirement pension, credit cards, and who - like any non-legalized activity - hardly could seek help when facing danger, such as sexual harassment or violence.

Hopefully the legalising process will provide them with the same rights as any other workers in South Korea, and will also help fixing prices, which has been a big issue as the Tattoo Union shared with me,” says the filmmaker.

The process to full recognition, however, will be lengthy, as the law will come into force in two years. Social change, too, will take time, as opinion polls show that most South Koreans still view tattoos in a negative light.

“The legalising process is still ongoing, and the next two years will be pivotal for the workers,” says Touili-Idrissi, adding that the social stigma is a particularly difficult and complex matter to address.

“The social stigma regarding tattoos is something that laws cannot necessarily change, and it seems to me that this will remain by the time the law passes, as it is in most countries. Now that tattooists will be legally considered as workers, I hope that it will make it easier for them to engage in broader discussions around tattoo art in South Korea,” he says.