Product Description

Danzig Baldaevís father was an academic, an ethnologist who found himself imprisoned under Soviet rule as an enemy of the people. In fact much of Baldaevís family moved through the Soviet prison system, while he became a guard. At his father's suggestion, he used his access to document and study the tattoos that were pervasive among the truly criminal portion of the prison population, the vory v zakonye, or legitimate thieves, a semi-professional class who keep their own brutal laws. During his 30 years supervising inmates in St. Petersburgís notorious Kresty Prison, Baldaev recorded over 3,000 of their tattoos and parsed their meaning--the nihilistic creativity of a closed society--in the drawings and text that made the first volume of the Russian Criminal Tattoo Encyclopedia a bestseller. This essential second volume, which collects all new, previously unseen photographs and drawings, goes to the extremes of his incredible collection. Sergei Vasilievís photographs authenticate the images, Baldaev's drawings make sense of them, and through them both we glimpse an extraordinary world where the criminalís position, history and even sexual preference are displayed indelibly on his body, and that marked body serves as a passport into the underworld.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #473418 in Books
• Published on: 2006-06-01
• Released on: 2006-06-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 400 pages

Review
This completely mind-blowing book told us what the tattoos meant, and how they could become central to the movie. -- David Cronenberg. Director, Eastern Promises (2007)

Customer Reviews

Wow!
Excellent photos and artwork with clear, concise explanations. An excellent collector's item, but not really a suggested "coffee table" book. There's quite a bit of nudity, graphic political and sexual imagery, and one heaping dose of harsh reality.

The real deal
This is the real deal. Filled with illustrations of tattoos and their meanings. This is not a fluffy book with happy hearts and tribal motifs. It is gritty, nasty, often explicit tattoos from the prisons in Russia.

As a tattooed guy who spends a lot of time over there, it is also a valuable reference.

My only regret is that there aren't more photos. Much of the book is drawings ... good ones... but I would like to see a lot more photographs of the people.

Perhaps I will just have to buy one of his other books

Imagine having your professional life story, including your misdeeds, tattooed on your body...
and you'll begin to get an idea of the contents of this amazing book. The "Vory v zakone" (literally "thieves in law")are Russia's criminal underworld and their existence dates back to the days of Tsarist prisons. They have their own elaborate set of laws, their own culture, and each thief's professional resume is tattooed on his body.

The author of this book, a former Russian prison guard, spent years documenting these tattoos and unraveling their meanings, and in the process has created a fascinating cultural history. Be forewarned, however, these tattoos are not like anything you've probably ever seen before, even in the American prison system. Many of them are quite shocking in their sexual detail and depiction of violence. Some of these tattoos were forcibly applied to the wearers' bodies, as punishment for reneging on gambling debts, serving as an informant, or other infractions of the thieves' code. This is not a book you'll want to let your kids get ahold of, as most of the "art" depicted is quite repellent. But it's a glimpse into a world most people didn't even know existed until the arrival of the Russian mob in the US and the release of movies like "Eastern Promises."

From my perspective, I'm glad that most of the tattoos are drawings, not photographs. It makes it easier to see some of the fine details in the tattoos. If you have an interest in crime and the criminal underworld, this book makes for a fascinating read.