The exhibition, featuring over 200 works and objects from public and private collections worldwide, presents a comprehensive survey of tattooing practices in the Mediterranean from antiquity to the present day.
The Museums of Marseille present at the Centre de la Vieille Charité Tattooing. Histories of the Mediterranean, an exploration of tattooing practices through the centuries, from antiquity to contemporary culture.
From the earliest traces found in Egypt, Syria, and the Cyclades, then in Greece, tattooing in the Mediterranean has evolved through the ages, shaped by medical, religious, political, and aesthetic uses, becoming in modern times a distinctive art form fueled by pop culture. The exhibition traces this evolution, from ancient tattooing to contemporary influences, particularly in Marseille, where tattooing has also become an expression of local identity.
From Italy to Algeria, the Balkans to Iran, Spain to Cyprus, this project draws on the methodologies of global art history, embracing the complex geographies of the Mediterranean, as well as gender studies and postcolonial research. It offers a renewed reflection on this region, marked by porous borders and the many confessional, commercial, artistic, and cultural exchanges that have shaped it over time.
Paintings, sculptures, photographs, videos, fashion, and everyday objects punctuate the visitor's journey, blending contributions from history, art history, archaeology, ethnology, and anthropology. The exhibition also highlights contemporary tattoo variations in Marseille and their place within the imaginations of pop culture.
Extending research initiated in 2023 as part of the exhibition Baya. An Algerian Heroine of Modern Art, the exhibition also places a central focus on artists from the Mediterranean basin who have drawn from tattoo motifs to build formal repertoires that have enriched avant-garde movements, as well as feminist and decolonial currents in Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Egypt, and Iran.
The exhibition will showcase previously unseen works by figures such as Choukri Mesli, Samta Benyahia, Farid Belkahia, Lalla Essaydi, and El Meya, alongside two drawings by the artist Ahmed Cherkaoui, created in 1967 and acquired by the City of Marseille in 2024.
The exhibition will also feature a new, specially commissioned work by Algerian artist Denis Martinez, one of the founders of the avant-garde group Aouchem (meaning "Tattoo") in the mid-1960s, who now lives between Blida and Marseille.
In partnership with 24 ORE Cultura and with the exceptional support of the musée du quai Branly - Jacques Chirac, the exhibition Tattooing. Histories of the Mediterranean benefits from significant loans from national and international institutions, including the Louvre Museum, Musée d'Orsay, musée du quai Branly - Jacques Chirac, the National Center for Visual Arts, the Museo Nazionale Etrusco di Villa Giulia in Rome, the Musei Civici in Pavia, the Museo Archeologico Nazionale e Castello di Manfredonia, the Rijksmuseum van Oudheden in Leiden, the Glyptothek in Munich, the Museo Arqueológico Nacional in Madrid, the Allard Pierson Museum in Amsterdam, alongside the heritage collections preserved by the network of Marseille Museums.
Chief Curator
Nicolas Misery, Director of the Museums of Marseille
