.the temple of her skin is imagined and co-curated by Jessica Horn and Laurence Sessou.
We are two African women who felt inspired by each other’s tattoo and scarification journeys and by how these connected to histories of other African women’s rituals, spiritual practices, emotions, traditions and wild imaginations around tattooing and scarification. This is largely undocumented terrain. We want to encourage the dialogue and create space for more stories to emerge….
Laurence Sessouis a bodywork therapist, aromatherapist and an artist muse, and has been practicing for over 14 years. She is founder of Azoouiwa, a platform that champions the work of women activists, healers and creatives. Laurence’s tattooing journey started when she was 30, and she has since broken ground as one of the few black women with tattoos and scarifications in the modelling industry. She has been featured in Stylist Magazine, Urban Ink, Things and Ink and BBC 3,
Laurence’s tattoos and scarifications are a representation of her spiritual breakthroughs, expressing a celebration of her life and spiritual path.
Laurence is a French national with roots in the Republic of Benin, and lives in London. Her grandfather was a chief and spiritual healer in Comé, Benin. Both of her grandmothers were initiated high priestesses and dancers in the voodoo tradition.
To learn more about Laurence visit moniasse.com
Jessica Horn is a feminist activist, strategist and writer with roots in Uganda. With a background in medical anthropology her activist organising and writing has been rooted in the movement for embodied liberation. She has worked in women’s rights for two decades, supporting the struggle for women to live healthy, autonomous lives in their own bodies.
Jessica’s curiosity about tattooing started in her childhood in the South Pacific. She was first inked in her early twenties by a Tahitian traditional artists in Paris, and has continued to search for artists who ink with an understanding of the spiritual and ceremonial dimensions of the art.
With a passion for documenting African women’s lives and resistance, Jessica was co-founder and commissioning editor of Our Africa on openDemocracy. She is co-editor of Voice, Power and Soul: Volume I Portraits of African feminists and co-producer of the film interview series Know Your African Feminists -the first documentary series of its size profiling African feminists. Her writing has been published in several platforms including Al Jazeera, The Guardian, Africa is a Country and academic journals Feminist Africa and The Lancet. Her poetry is published in The MouthmarkBook of Poetry alongside WarsanShire, Malika Booker and Inua Ellams.
To learn more about Jessica visit stillsherises.com