Christian Warlich

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Christian Warlich (born January 5, 1891 in Hanover , † February 27, 1964 in Hamburg ) was a German innkeeper and tattoo artist ; He was the first in Germany to use an electric tattoo machine and is considered the "forefather of German tattoo artists".

Life

Warlich spent his childhood in Hannover-Linden . He left his parents' house at the age of 14, went to Dortmund and completed an apprenticeship as a boiler maker . During this time he tattooed manually without a machine. After a few years as a journeyman, he went to sea and came into contact with a tattoo machine for the first time on a trip to the USA . Warlich married in Hamburg in 1914 and opened a restaurant in 1919 at Kieler Strasse 44 (today Clemens-Schultz-Strasse) on St. Pauli . There he divided off an area called the Modern Tattoo Studio . In the early days, Theodor Vetter , as a Koberer , ensured a steady supply of customers.

According to his own statement, Warlich tattooed "Everything that the male body should express [...] politics, eroticism, athletics, aesthetics, religion, in all colors, in all places" . In a legal dispute regarding a facial tattoo that a competitor had done for a 21-year-old advertising contractor, however, he commented "A decent tattoo artist does not tattoo on the face" .

In his forty years as a tattoo artist, Warlich had over 50,000 customers, including Prince Axel of Denmark and Viggo von Rosenborg from the Danish royal family. He died of a brain tumor while working in his tattoo parlor.

Removal of tattoos

In addition to his artistic work as a tattoo artist, Warlich experimented on methods for removing tattoos; "He was also a pioneer of tattoo removal." Waslich developed acid-based tinctures that were applied to the skin and gradually peeled off the tattooed skin layer, then the skin with the color layer could be peeled off. This method, described as painless, left visible scars on the skin. He was so successful with this method that the Eppendorf University Medical Center (UKE) referred patients to him. Warlich kept the recipes he had worked out for himself as working capital , but wanted to leave them to the UKE after his death. However, his unexpected death prevented his knowledge from being passed on. In 1935 he had to reveal the recipe for the tincture to the police after complications arose with a client he treated . Initially, the physician Claus Udo Fritzemeier researched standard de-tattooing solutions; he tried to understand Warlich's recipes as part of his dissertation and came to plausible results. In 1997, Ole Wittmann discovered a recipe in Warlich's estate in the Hamburg State Archives .

Warlich's tincture consisted of distilled water , potash, table salt , sulfuric acid and ether or acetone . The acid acted as a caustic agent and ether or acetone as a means of transport into the skin. The tattoo to be removed was painted with the acidic solution and allowed to act for 20 minutes. The area was then dabbed with purified gasoline. This treatment should be repeated after 24 and 48 hours until the treated skin was evenly brown. If necessary, it could also be carried out a fourth time. Twelve days after the last treatment, the tattoo was sealed airtight with a plaster and leukoplast . 48 hours later, if the treatment is successful, the tattooed skin layer should be lifted off with tweezers. Warlich recommended moist dressings with boron ointment to allow the wound to heal . Any swellings should be treated with acetic acid clay and the newly grown skin should be cared for with healing ointments.

Trivia

After Warlich's death, Theodor Vetter (Tattoo Theo) saved the entire estate from the dump. In 2013 , Warlich's master book was exhibited in the Hamburg Museum as part of the exhibition Where to go with the city , which was published as a facsimile in 2019 . Warlich's daughter Elli Schmidt had sold it to the museum in 1965, along with photographs and other documents.

research

Ole Wittmann & Manfred Kohrs in the Museum of Hamburg History 2019
Status of the research project Nachlass Warlich at the Tattoo Expo Aachen 2017

The Hamburg art historian Ole Wittmann , who wrote “Tattoos in Art. Materiality - Motive - Reception ”, headed the research project“ The legacy of the Hamburg tattoo artist Christian Warlich (1891–1964) ”- also known as“ Warlich legacy ”, which was carried out with the support of the Hamburg Foundation for the Promotion of Science and Culture in cooperation with the Hamburg Historical Museums Foundation / Museum for Hamburg History from 2015 to 2020. The estate also includes the master album by the neighborhood tattoo artist Christian Warlich, which looks like a relic in the tattoo scene. As part of a research project scheduled to run for at least three years, Wittmann has now brought out the volume, as he was the first to study the Warlich estate in detail.

"The integration of the artistic aspect into tattooing is part of Warlich's historical significance."

- Ole Wittmann

Wittmann's primary source for the research work is an article by folklore professor Adolf Spamer from 1933. The media have already reported several times on the subject of Christian Warlich and on Wittmann's research. According to the birth register, Warlich was not born in 1890, but only a year later, on January 5, 1891, and died on February 27, 1964. Whether the wrong year of birth on Warlich's tombstone is based on Spamer's incorrect information will probably no longer be clarified. It is also not confirmed that he worked as a boilermaker. What is certain, however, as the city of his birth, is that he went hiking early, around 1905, and tattooed in Dortmund for two to three years. In a correspondence researched by Wittmann, Warlich describes Dortmund as a kind of tattoo artist stronghold, “that he has established himself there and displaced the botchers working on site”. In 1917 his name appears for the first time in the address book of the city of Hamburg. However, it is possible that he lived in Hamburg before; a photo from 1909 shows him in Hamburg, and his first marriage was in Hamburg in 1914.

During his Warlich research, Ole Wittmann came across a template album by the Hamburg tattoo artist Karl Finke , who was Warlich's contemporary and competitor, at the Institute for Saxon History and Folklore in Dresden . Finke's album titled Book No. 3 was published in September 2017 in connection with accompanying texts by Wittmann and published by Nachlass Warlich. This is the first comprehensive publication to emerge from the Warlich estate research project.

This first publication published by the research project Nachlass Warlich was submitted to the Art Directors Club in the design / book category and was awarded a “bronze nail”. In addition, the book, which was implemented in cooperation with the Leipzig University of Graphics and Book Art , was nominated for participation in the German Design Award 2019. Together with Warlich, Finke is one of the most important personalities in German tattoo history. Both are considered to be protagonists of Hamburg's tattoo scene in the first half of the 20th century.

exhibition

From November 2019 to May 2020 the Museum of Hamburg History will be showing a special exhibition entitled Tattoo Legends. Christian Warlich on St. Pauli , which is curated by Ole Wittmann . "The Warlich exhibition is ... the first in the world on a historical tattoo artist."

“Numerous original template sheets by Warlich - with mythical creatures, wild animals and seafaring motifs - can be seen in the exhibition and shine from the walls in contrasting colors. The heart of the exhibition, however, is Warlich's template album. It is considered to be the most famous document in German tattoo history ... "

- Juliane Reil : Deutschlandfunk

The monothematic exhibition on Christian Warlich shows "Insights into the then still young" scene ", photos, videos, peeled skin areas with removed tattoos, all of which garnished with various real exhibits such as tattoo machines, books, tickets and IDs." Information about the further course of events the German tattoo history of the 1970s with exhibits on Theodor Vetter , Horst Klassenbach and Manfred Kohrs .

Media coverage

literature

  • Ole Wittmann (Ed.): Christian Warlich: Tattoo Flash Book. Template album of the King of Tattooists / Original Designs by the King of Tattooists . Prestel, Munich 2019, ISBN 978-3-7913-5896-3 (facsimile, bilingual: German / English).
  • Adolf Spamer: The tattoo in the German port cities. An attempt to capture their forms and their image quality. Edited by Markus Eberwein and Werner Petermann. Trickster, Munich 1993, ISBN 3-923804-69-5 . (First published in: Niederdeutsche Zeitschrift für Volkskunde. No. 11, 1933, pp. 1–55; 129–182).
  • Marcel Feige : Tattoo-Theo: The tattooed person from the neighborhood. The biography of the great Hamburg tattoo legend, Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf, 2001, ISBN 3-89602-355-1 .
  • Marcel Feige (ed.): A tattoo is forever, Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf, Berlin 2002, ISBN 3-89602-381-0 .
  • Ole Wittmann: Tattoos in Art. Materiality - motifs - reception. Reimer, Berlin 2017, ISBN 978-3-496-01569-7 .
  • Ulrich Bauche : Estate of the tattoo artist Christian Warlich. In: Contributions to German folklore and antiquity. 11th Volume, 1967, pp. 107-108.
  • Ole Wittmann: tattoo legends. In: Hamburg History Live Magazin . No. 2, 2016, pp. 16-21.
  • Heide Heim: The Holy Grail. In: Tattoo magazine . No. 248, vol. 22, October 2016, pp. 74–83.
  • Andreas Coenen: Warlich, Finke, Wittmann - On the paths of the Hamburg tattoo tradition. In: Tattoo Kulture Magazine . No. 21, June 27, 2017.
  • Ole Wittmann (Ed.): Karl Finke: Book No. 3. A template album by the Hamburg tattooist / A Flash Book by the Hamburg Tattooist. Warlich estate, Henstedt-Ulzburg 2017, ISBN 978-3-00-056648-6 .
  • Stephan Oettermann (Editor), Christian Warlich (Author): Tattoos. Template album of the king of tattooists. DBT im Bertelsmannverlag, Munich 1999, ISBN 3-88379-277-2 . (First edition: Harenberg, Dortmund 1981)
  • Alina L. Tiews, Ole Wittmann: There's something like that! - Tattoos on post-war television . In: Film- und Fernsehmuseum Hamburg eV (Ed.): Hamburger Flimmern . No. 24 , December 2017, p. 10–13 ( PDF [accessed on February 21, 2020] report on Chritian Warlich's media presence on post-war television).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Ulrich Bauche: Estate of the tattoo artist Christian Warlich. In: Contributions to German folklore and antiquity. 11th Volume 1967, pp. 107-108.
  2. ↑ Stadtkind Hannovermagazin. July 2016, pp. 44–49: needle sticks. Interview: Manfred Kohrs .
  3. ^ Hall of Fame - Christian Warlich. Retrieved July 25, 2014 .
  4. ↑ Kilian TROTIER: history with serious consequences . In: The time . No. April 17 , 2017 ( zeit.de [accessed on September 11, 2017]).
  5. ↑ Julika Pohle: King of the engravers. In: The world. Retrieved July 11, 2016 .
  6. ↑ Marcel Feige: The Tattoo and Piercing Lexicon. Pp. 346-347.
  7. ↑ Snake on the forehead . In: Der Spiegel . No. 10 , 1951, pp. 8-9 ( online ).
  8. ^ Christian Warlich. In: Tattoo Spirit of May 5, 2014. Retrieved July 14, 2016 .
  9. ^ A b Marcel Feige: The Tattoo and Piercing Lexicon. P. 348.
  10. ↑ Miriam Stolzenwald: Exhibition about the "King of Tattoo Artists" November 27, 2019 11:04 am - NDR Kultur
  11. ↑ Claus Udo Fritzemeier: Development of a new method for removing tattoos: (standard solution for tattooing, ETSL) . University of Hamburg, Faculty of Medicine, Hamburg 1972 (dissertation).
  12. ↑ Thomas Joerdens: Tattoo artist Christian Warlich: The image maker of St. Pauli. In: Märkische Oderzeitung. January 5, 2020, accessed May 8, 2020 .
  13. ↑ Christian Warlich: Instructions for use for removing tattoos . Self-published, Hamburg (exhibit in the Museum of Hamburg History).
  14. ↑ Exhibition structure “Where to go with the city?”: Tattoo book by Christian Warlich, the “King of Tattoo Artists”. Retrieved July 27, 2014 .
  15. ^ Christian Warlich: Tattoo Flash Book. Template album of the King of Tattooists / Original Designs by the King of Tattooists . Ed .: Ole Wittmann . Prestel, Munich 2019, ISBN 978-3-7913-5896-3 (facsimile, bilingual: German / English, also available as a special edition limited to 200 copies).
  16. ↑ Tattoo Magazine. 22nd year, issue 248, October 2016, p. 78.
  17. ↑ Stefanie Handke: portalkunstgeschichte.de: book reviews Ole Wittmann: Tattoos in der Kunst. Materiality - motifs - reception. Reimer 2017.
  18. ↑ "Warlich Estate"
  19. ↑ Warlich estate. Research and exhibition project "The estate of the Hamburg tattoo artist Christian Warlich (1890–1964)". Retrieved January 22, 2016 .
  20. ↑ Ole Wittmann: Call of October 30, 2015. In: Foundation Historical Museums Hamburg / Museum for Hamburg History. Retrieved January 22, 2016 .
  21. ↑ Julika Pohle: King of the engravers. In: THE WORLD. Retrieved July 11, 2016 .
  22. ↑ Anna Felicity Friedman, James Elkins, Lars Krutak , Matt Lodder, Nick Schonberger, Sebastien Galliot, Ole Wittmann: The World Atlas of Tattoo. Yale University Press, 2015, ISBN 978-0-300-21048-4 , p. 398.
  23. ↑ Pascal Bagot: The king of tattooists. ( Memento from July 14, 2016 in the web archive archive.today ) In: tatowiermagazin. November 20, 2011.
  24. ↑ Julika Pohle: King of the engravers. (PDF) (No longer available online.) In: Welt am Sonntag. July 10, 2016, archived from the original on October 3, 2016 ; Retrieved October 3, 2016 (No. 28).
  25. ↑ Sonja Kättner-Neumann, Aline Braun: In the footsteps of Christian Warlich. In: NDR - DAS! Retrieved October 30, 2016 (first broadcast October 26, 2016 at 6:45 p.m.).
  26. ↑ Tattoo Magazine . 22nd year, issue 248, October 2016, pp. 74–83.
  27. ^ Andreas Coenen: "Warlich - Finke - Wittmann. On the ways of the Hamburg tattoo tradition ”[Interview with Ole Wittmann] . In: Tattoo Kulture Magazine . Issue 4 (July / August), No. 21 , 2017, p. 30-38 .
  28. ↑ adc.de ( Memento from April 18, 2018 in the Internet Archive )
  29. ↑ PDF Winner List ADC Competition 2018 page 7 of 13.
  30. ↑ Project name: Karl Finke: Book No. 3. A template album by the Hamburg tattoo artist, project name: book, project ID: GDA2019-31344. Team German Design Award 2019, German Design Council Service GmbH.
  31. ↑ adc.de ( Memento from April 18, 2018 in the Internet Archive )
  32. ↑ Ole Wittmann (Ed.): Karl Finke: Book No. 3. A template album by the Hamburg tattooist / A Flash Book by the Hamburg Tattooist. Warlich estate, Henstedt-Ulzburg 2017, ISBN 978-3-00-056648-6 .
  33. ^ Foundation Historical Museums Hamburg: Tattoo Legends. Christian Warlich on St. Pauli. In: Ruhr University Bochum word mark. April 11, 2018. Retrieved July 29, 2019 .
  34. ↑ olewittmann.de lectures, accessed on July 29, 2019
  35. ↑ Juliane Reil: Exhibition on Christian Warlich The forefather of the tattoo artist. Deutschlandfunk, November 28, 2019.
  36. ↑ Norman Gosch: Tattoo-Legenden: Christian Warlich on St. Pauli online magazine report ink from November 28, 2019.
  37. ↑ Dissertation Hamburg 2015.
personal data
SURNAME Warlich, Christian
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German tattoo artist and innkeeper
DATE OF BIRTH January 5, 1891
PLACE OF BIRTH Hanover
DATE OF DEATH February 27, 1964
Place of death Hamburg