An ASU student has proved that even the most unique hobbies, like ancient tattooing, can have a broader purpose.

Lars Krutak, an anthropology graduate student and “tattoo anthropologist,” is the star of new show “Tattoo Hunter” on the Discovery Channel.

Krutak said that the show is about ancient tattooing practices of indigenous people around the world.

“No one’s ever really taken tattoos seriously,” Krutak said.
However, people may now see that tattoos have a greater significance, especially when it comes to ancient tattooing and the cultures involved, he said.

“These traditions are basically dead and dying,” Krutak said.

He said that he hopes the show, which premiered March 7, will revive ancient tattooing in some way and at least get people interested in its significance.

“It seemed like no one had given this subject attention,” Krutak said. “The medium of television is great because it reaches so many more people.”

The drama of the topic translates into the show, Krutak said, and will easily draw in viewers.

For example, during the first episode, Krutak said he received more than 450 razor-blade cuts on his chest as part of a ritual for the Kaningara tribe of Papua New Guinea.

“A lot of people think it’s great TV — it’s intense and fascinating to see other cultures,” he said.

Krutak added that his role on the show is like a tour guide and that he wanted to do the show for the people.

“It’s for them to tell the tale, for them to tell the stories,” he said.
Krutak said he first became involved with ancient tattooing when he was a graduate student in Alaska in 1996.

“I saw this Inuit woman, and she had three tattoos on her chin,” he said.
This experience led to Krutak’s hobby of researching ancient tattoos and helping to preserve them as part of the culture of many people, such as the Kalinga people in the Philippines.

The episode involving Krutak’s trip to the Kalinga village will be aired Saturday on the Discovery Channel at 1 p.m.

Naty Sugguiyao, co-author of the book that Krutak is working on, “Voices of the Ancestors: The Living Tradition of Kalinga Batok (Tattoo),” was the translator for the show’s episode in the Philippines.

Sugguiyao said in an e-mail that she is connected with the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples, is a member of the Kalinga tribe and “a descendent of one of the fiercest headhunters in Kalinga who wore warrior tattoos.”

She said that she is concerned about the loss of ancient tattooing culture that the show focuses on.

“The Kalinga art of tattooing has vanished and [is] no longer practiced by the Kalingas, influenced by the notion that it is ugly and only killers wear it,” Sugguiyao said.

She said she appreciates Tattoo Hunter and the work that Krutak has done.

“It gives a glimpse of the Kalinga culture and its people in a manner that we were not demeaned and misrepresented,” Sugguiyao said.

Elle Festin, one of the co-founders of the Filipino-American organization Mark of the Four Waves, has also been in contact with Krutak regarding ancient tattoos.

Festin said he is concerned because “when we revived this art, within five years, in some ways people started giving up [on ancient tattooing].”

The research and process of finding books with information about tattooing in the Philippines are hard to find and expensive, which discouraged many members of the group, he said.

The historical books, most printed in the ’60s and ’70s, had very little information and “you’re lucky if you get to see a picture,” Festin said.
He said there were some complications with the Kalinga warriors in the village, where he went with Krutak and Sugguiyao to tattoo people and help with interviews for the upcoming book.

“When Lars comes up to interview them, they would tell him a different story,” Festin said.

He said the Kalinga people might have been doing this unintentionally because by instinct they believe “only blood relatives should know the deeper meaning of tattoos.”

Festin also said that the times in which the show is played around the world are inconvenient to most people and hopes this is changed — as well as the fact that little advertisement is done in the U.S., unlike Europe.

“If it was commercialized very well, I think it could hype up everyone to get really educated about other people’s cultures,” Festin said.

Reach the reporter at reweaver@asu.edu.