Europe goes greyer for tattoos

The EU has prohibited some pigments, deeming them potentially hazardous to humans. Artists and manufacturers around the world are struggling to find replacements

PUBLISHED : 17 JUL 2022 

NEWSPAPER SECTION: SUNDAY SPOTLIGHT

WRITER: TED  ALCORN

Works by the tattoo artist Alex De Pase, known for his photorealistic tattoos, at his home studio in the village of Grado. CIRIL JAZBEC/nyt

Along a bare torso and down a thigh, the sun glints through ocean waters and bathes coral and fish in aqueous light. On a lower leg, vivid frogs tense, as if preparing to jump from dewy leaves. A mischievous child with twinkling blue eyes stares out from an inner bicep.

In his home studio in the northern Italian village of Grado, Alex De Pase reviewed photographs of some of the thousands of designs he had inked over his career as a tattoo artist. But these skinscapes might not be possible to replicate in 2023 -- at least not with the same set of colours.

The tattoo artist Alex De Pase works on a customer at his home studio in the village of Grado, Italy. photos:  CIRIL JAZBEC/nyt

New regulations on tattoo inks and permanent makeup that began taking effect across the European Union in January were meant to reduce the risk of including ingredients that could be health hazards. The regulations have also caused the biggest shakeup of the industry in memory, with ink manufacturers reformulating entire product lines to comply.

The possibility of even more disruption hangs over artists' heads next year, when bans go into effect on green and blue pigments that ink manufacturers say may be impossible to replace. This has provoked an uproar among tattooists who have argued the restrictions are overbroad, sow unnecessary concern among clients and undermine their art.

Europe's regulations could portend changes in the United States, where the Food and Drug Administration has some oversight of inks and pigments. In November, when Dr Linda Katz, director of the agency's Office of Cosmetics and Colors, gave a presentation at a conference on tattoo safety in Berlin and was asked whether the country would align its regulations with Europe's, she responded: "That remains to be seen, and we're working on that area itself."

A full sleeve by the tattoo artist Alex De Pase, known for his colour portraits, in the village of Grado, Italy. CIRIL JAZBEC/nyt

Mr De Pase, who is known for the photorealism of his tattoos -- particularly his portraits -- which he inks in his home studio, says he carefully mixes different shades to achieve the subtleties of skin tone. "I'm well-known because of my colour tattoos," he said. "For me, this is an issue."

Tattoo Trends and Toxicology

Once the rebellious mark of sailors and bikers, tattoos long ago shed any vestige of being a fringe art form. Surveys indicate about one-quarter of Europeans aged 18 to 35 and nearly one-third of American adults sport tattoos.

The tattoo artist Alex De Pase, who owns nine tattoo parlours, at his home studio in the village of Grado, Italy. CIRIL JAZBEC/nyt

Given all that inked flesh, documented complications are relatively uncommon and typically involve bacterial infections or allergic reactions. But regulators have not kept up with the popularity of body art. Only a few European countries exert national oversight of tattoo inks. Until this year, there were no binding standards across the European Union.

Modern tattoo inks are complex concoctions. They include insoluble pigments that provide shade or colour, binding agents to keep the pigments suspended in liquid as they are transferred to the skin and water and other solvents such as glycerin and alcohol that influence the ink's qualities, along with preservatives and other additives.

Upon injection, some pigment remains permanently in the skin, but it can also migrate to the lymph nodes. When exposed to sunlight or during laser removal, pigments may also cleave into new, potentially more toxic compounds and circulate throughout the body.

Over the years, traditional ink manufacturers have incorporated heavy metals such as barium and copper into their pigments to create a widening palette of colours, and neurotoxic agents like cadmium, lead and arsenic have been documented in some inks in high concentrations. These elements may also be found in so-called vegan inks, which merely exclude animal-derived glycerins and other ingredients.

Sample batches of new inks at the World Famous Tattoo Ink manufacturing facility in Blythewood, South Carolina. JUAN DIEGO REYES/nyt

Since 2015, Europe has required manufacturers to label inks indicating hazardous ingredients they contain. But because raw pigments are manufactured at an industrial scale for use in all manner of products, including clothing and automobiles, they are not always of a purity one might hope for in a substance injected into one's skin.

Ines Schreiver, co-director of the Federal Institute for Risk Assessment in Germany, which focused on the toxicology of tattoos, said that basic questions about the body's exposure to the inks remained unanswered. Among the unknowns are how much ink enters the body, the relationship between that exposure and adverse reactions that occasionally follow and any illness that may emerge years later.

"I would not use the word 'safe' or 'unsafe' to describe tattooing," she said. "I tell my friends to inform themselves about possible side effects and about the uncertainties."

After lengthy deliberations by the European Chemicals Agency, the European Commission opted to focus on substances known to be hazardous, banning a long list of chemicals already prohibited for use in cosmetics and sharply limiting the concentrations of certain corrosive or irritating compounds.

Chemists brew a batch of blue ink at World Famous Tattoo Ink in an effort to find a substitute for banned blue dye. JUAN DIEGO REYES/nyt

The ban included two pigments, Blue 15:3 and Green 7, based in part on decades-old research that linked their use in hair dyes with an elevated risk of bladder cancer. Acknowledging ink manufacturers' objections that there were no substitutes for those pigments but lacking evidence to affirm their safety, the commission delayed its prohibition until next year.

"The substances are injected into the human body for permanent and prolonged contact -- for life," said Ana María Blass Rico, a commission policy officer. "So that's why it's so protective."

Dr Jorgen Serup, a Danish dermatologist who since 2008 has run a renowned "tattoo clinic" at Bispebjerg Hospital in Copenhagen, said regulations were overdue. But in his opinion, these were poorly targeted, proscribing many substances that would never be used in tattoos while failing to address known problems like bacterial contamination of inks during production.

Alessio Vettori, whose legs sport designs by the tattoo artist Alexa De Pase, in the village of Grado. CIRIL JAZBEC/nyt

Among thousands of patients he treated for complications, he found that red was more commonly associated with allergic reactions. "There is, from the clinical side, no reason really to ban blue and green," he said.

In the United States, where many tattoo inks used in Europe are produced, manufacturers rushed to reformulate their products to meet the new standards. One of the leading suppliers, World Famous Tattoo Ink, has a new facility in Greenville, South Carolina, where each month in a sterile clean room, 400,000 bottles are filled and packaged.

The owner, Lou Rubino, opened his first tattoo supply shop on St Marks Place in New York in 1998, shortly after the city council lifted a long-standing ban on tattooing so that underground artists could work openly again. At the time, the company made its inks in a warehouse on Long Island. "I used to have people that would sit there filling the bottles with a commercial iced tea container with a spout on the bottom," he recalled.

The tattoo artist Alex De Pase and his customer Emanele Gressani prepare for a new tattoo in De Pase's home studio in the village of Grado. CIRIL JAZBEC/nyt

World Famous had updated its products previously, for example, to remove a formaldehyde-based preservative that had been banned in Switzerland. But Mr Rubino said the new regulations have required far-reaching changes, forcing the company to pay laboratories extra to assess whether the products met the allowable limits for the chemicals.

Because World Famous did not test its products on animals, employees and their families and friends volunteered their skin to gauge the performance of the new inks.

Although World Famous had been exploring replacements for the banned pigments, Mr Rubino said they had not yet found any suitable substitutes. "If that doesn't work out, there's going to be a lot less blue and green in tattoos," he said.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

Copyright: © 2022 by The New York Times

Why an accused Liberian warlord was killed in Canada

By Robin Levinson-King
BBC News July 16,2022

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IMAGE SOURCE,CHRISTOPHE SIMON

Image caption,

Militiamen of Charles Taylor's National Patriotic Front of Liberia cheering in the streets.

Bill Horace, an accused Liberian warlord who fled to Canada, was shot to death in 2020. Now, his alleged killer will appear in court. Can justice ever be truly served?

It was the early hours before dawn when Bill Horace and his wife Joyce awoke to the sound of breaking glass.

They had been sleeping in their pink split-level home in London, Ontario, which they shared with their children Royce and Kobe, ages 9 and 4, when four armed men broke through the basement window.

It was Father's Day.

A struggle ensued, and shots were fired, with several bullets hitting Horace, who dragged himself outside to seek help. The men ran away after taking C$20,000 ($15,300; £13,000) in cash.

He died later in hospital.

News of the shooting - in a town of 400,000, about two hours from Toronto - made headlines, not just because of the violent nature of the attack but because of the identity of the victim. Bill Horace was an accused warlord in his home country of Liberia.

Although he was never charged with war crimes in Liberia or Canada, several people have identified him as a commander in former Liberian president Charles Taylor's army.

Taylor was convicted of crimes against humanity in the neighbouring country of Sierra Leone and is serving a 50-year sentence.

At first, many wondered if the shooting had been retaliation for Horace's alleged past sins.

Instead, police believe that Horace had become embroiled with criminals in his adopted country, and that he died as a result of his entanglement with a network of fraudsters.

They have charged Keiron Gregory, 23, with second-degree murder. The other three accused remain at large and have not been publicly identified.

IMAGE SOURCE,LONDON POLICE SERVICE

Image caption,

Keiron Gregory will appear in court on 18 July

Although it remains unknown exactly if Keiron knew Horace, records show both men have a controversial past.

Keiron is the son of a veteran Toronto police officer, and investigators claim he got his father Trevor Gregory to use his police connections to look up Horace's address after Horace allegedly took money from him.

Trevor Gregory pleaded guilty to breaching public trust in April. Keiron will next be in court on 18 July, when he is expected to enter a plea.

Massa Washington, a veteran journalist who served as a commissioner on Liberia's Truth and Reconciliation Commission, told BBC Focus on Africa that Mr Horace was one of the most "notorious" of Taylor's generals.

As a commissioner, she heard testimony from victims of human rights abuse during her country's brutal civil wars.

"He was alleged to have committed some of the most atrocious crimes that you could imagine - murder whole families, shot people to death, behead people," she said. "His men were involved in the rape of women, opening of pregnant women's stomachs."

Little is known about Horace's childhood - he was born around 1971, and fled his hometown of Buchanan in 1990 when the National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL), a rebel group led by Taylor, advanced on the area, according to reporting from Rodney Sieh for Front Page Africa Online.

Although it's unclear when he joined the NPFL, an extensive profile by Canadian magazine Maclean's said that in 1993, Horace commanded a group of NPFL soldiers and took part in a massacre.

"They came and accused us of looting and therefore said we should be executed," John Harmon told Maclean's in 2010. "Twenty-one were executed in all fashions. They were shot. They were beheaded. Some were nailed to the cross, like my brother, Steve. He was nailed to the cross and then later shot."

Ms Washington said Horace was named in the Liberia's Truth and Reconciliation Commission's final report and it was recommended that he face prosecution - but he was never charged. To date, no-one has ever been convicted in Liberia of war crimes committed in that country.

• Thousands dead but no prosecutions - why Liberia has not acted

In 2002, Horace moved across the ocean to Canada, where he applied for refugee status.

That status was eventually denied, but he remained in the country, appealing his removal several times. In 2009, he applied for permanent resident status, but at the time of his death, he was not a permanent resident, according to Maclean's.

In the 2010s, the Canadian Centre for International Justice (CCJI) tried to get the government to bring war crimes charges against Horace.

Matt Eisenbrandt, who was legal director of the CCIJ at the time of its investigation, told the BBC he gave Canadian police "a mountain of evidence on a silver platter", including the testimony of over a dozen witnesses who described "horrific" crimes allegedly committed by Horace and his soldiers.

But the government never brought criminal charges, pursuing an immigration case instead.

Geneviève Groulx, a spokesperson for Canada's justice department, said it does not comment on the existence of war crimes investigations unless charges are brought, in order to preserve the "integrity" of the process and the privacy of those involved. Citizenship and Immigration Canada also declined to comment.

If the horrors of Horace's past followed him across the sea, they mostly remained in the shadows. He had five children in Canada, including two with his wife Joyce, whom he married in 2010. He also has two daughters that live in Sweden.

A lawsuit has been filed on behalf of her and his family against the Toronto Police Services Board, former police chief Mark Saunders, Trevor Gregory, Keiron Gregory, and three unidentified assailants in his attack.

In the statement of claim, obtained by the BBC, the lawsuit describes the Horaces as "a close-knit family who spent every weekend together", and Horace himself as a loving father and devoted husband, who cooked for his children, took them on family vacations and to sports activities.

The lawsuit, which was filed in 2020, is asking for C$775,000 in damages due to the emotional and financial loss of Horace as a breadwinner. The suit alleges that TPSB and the former police chief are responsible for the actions of the elder Trevor Gregory. Lawyers on behalf of TPSB, Mr Saunders and Trevor Gregory filed a statement of intent to defend.

IMAGE SOURCE,RANDY RISLING

Image caption,

Former Toronto police chief Mark Saunders is named in Horace's family's lawsuit

Charges against police officer Trevor Gregory reveal what police say happened the days and hours before Horace was killed.

Just after midnight on 21 June 2020, the prosecution say Trevor got a text from his son Keiron, saying that he had been defrauded out of a large sum of money and that he had the licence plate of the man who had done it.

Shortly after, Trevor texted his police connections "strange car creeping through my hood… could you run this for me", the charges say.

After a colleague provided him with the address, Trevor wrote the information down on a piece of paper and invited his son over to his home. He stepped out of the room while his son took a photo of the information, the prosecution allege. Trevor will be sentenced in August.

He is currently suspended with pay from the police force, and is facing professional misconduct charges.

While it's unclear how Horace had crossed paths with Keiron, both men are alleged to have been involved in crime in south-western Ontario.

Horace's immigration documents say he earned a living through importing and exporting farm equipment, but in 2013, he was charged with theft under $5,000, fraud and making counterfeit money.

The fraud and counterfeit charges were dropped, and he was found guilty of theft under $5,000 and sentenced to 12 months probation in 2016, according to the Toronto Star.

Meanwhile, the police officer's son had racked up a dozen charges, but no convictions, since 2016.

While Keiron and his father have been called to court for their alleged roles in Horace's death, those familiar with Horace's past are upset he escaped justice.

Canada missed an opportunity to provide some justice for survivors in Liberia, Mr Eisenbrandt said. "Instead, his own violent demise was a damning indictment of the government's failures in this case."

And Ms Washington said: "I don't think is a very good news for Liberians, especially his victims, because justice has not been served in this case."

"He's dead and gone. He's not going to face the war crimes court, he's not going to be able to account on this earth for the wickedness."

Robert Reich: What Casablanca Teaches Us – OpEd

July 17, 2022
By Robert Reich

A while back, I shared with you my love of Frank Capra’s “It’s a Wonderful Life” — the essential American fable about the generosity and goodness of Americans toward one another, as opposed to the greedy oligarchs at the top (such as Mr. Potter) who care only about building their own wealth and power.

In light of Putin’s war and the rise of authoritarianism around the world, including the United States, I’ve been thinking about another favorite of mine — Michael Kurtiz’s fabulous 1942 classic, “Casablanca.” Even now, 70 years after its release, it feels relevant and poignant.

In the first six decades after World War II, the number of countries considered democratic grew. But researchers have found that, starting five or six years ago, the number of democracies in the world began to shrink, and existing democracies have become less democratic. Consider the rise of strongman rule in Hungary, the Philippines, and Russia, attacks on the courts in Poland, Hindu extremism in India, fears of a power grab in Brazil, and, of course, Trump’s continuing attempted coup.

Which brings me back to Casablanca. Few movies have ever produced as many quotes — “Here’s looking at you, kid,” and “We’ll always have Paris,” and the song “As Time Goes By.” And can you think of any more enduring characters than those played by Ingrid Bergman and Humphrey Bogart?

But the core of Casablanca is a defense of democracy in the face of the rising specter of fascism. One of the most moving scenes to me is the dueling anthems — when the German occupants sing “Die Wacht am Rhein,” only to be drowned out by the French refugees singing “La Marseillaise.” I’m told that the tears in the eyes of several of the French actors and singers in this scene were unplanned and unrehearsed. Remember, this was filmed in 1942.

I’m curious about your take: What is it that makes this scene so powerful?

Robert B. Reich is Chancellor's Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley and Senior Fellow at the Blum Center for Developing Economies, and writes at robertreich.substack.com. Reich served as Secretary of Labor in the Clinton administration, for which Time Magazine named him one of the ten most effective cabinet secretaries of the twentieth century. He has written fifteen books, including the best sellers "Aftershock", "The Work of Nations," and"Beyond Outrage," and, his most recent, "The Common Good," which is available in bookstores now. He is also a founding editor of the American Prospect magazine, chairman of Common Cause, a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and co-creator of the award-winning documentary, "Inequality For All." He's co-creator of the Netflix original documentary "Saving Capitalism," which is streaming now.

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Meta wants to mimic TikTok: towards AI-driven disinformation


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Reporters Without Borders (RSF)
5 July 2022

A demonstrator poses with an installation depicting Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg surfing on a wave of cash and surrounded by distressed teenagers, during a protest in London, UK, 25 October 2021, TOLGA AKMEN/AFP via Getty Images

Mark Zuckerberg has decided to imitate his main competitor, TikTok, by giving artificial intelligence a greater role in the selection of content offered to his users.

This statement was originally published on rsf.org on 1 July 2022.

Mark Zuckerberg has decided to imitate his main competitor, TikTok, by giving artificial intelligence a greater role in the selection of content offered to his users. Reporters Without Borders (RSF) is alarmed by this decision and by the sign of a headlong rush towards even more disinformation.

“We’re basically shifting from having most of the content that you see in Facebook and Instagram come from your friend or follow graph, to now, you know, over time, having more and more of that content just come from AI recommendations.”

It was with these words that Zuckerberg confirmed to CNBC in an interview on 22 June that the Meta social media platforms Facebook and Instagram are going to follow the path set by TikTok.

He said nothing about the importance attached to reliable information in this new role being assigned to artificial intelligence, although his Chinese rival has been much criticised for the provision of false and misleading information. As the Californian tech giant’s current model, which prioritises interactions between users, is already harming access to reliable information, RSF is alarmed by a new strategic course that is taking one of the new champions of disinformation as a model.


“The big platforms are more innovative when it comes to defending their economic interests than they are about combatting disinformation,” said Vincent Berthier, the head of RSF’s Tech Desk. “By following the path forged by TikTok, Mark Zuckerberg is transitioning to a new era of prosperity for disinformation. The response to disinformation cannot be to promote it by means of artificial intelligence.”

A video app owned by the Chinese company ByteDance, TikTok is a formidable competitor for the US platforms. It claims to have 1.5 billion users and to have seen a 215% surge in earnings in 2021. Its success is based on its main feed, called “For You,” which is powered by an artificial intelligence that draws on all the content hosted on TikTok.

Any user can therefore be exposed to any content, without any transparency with regard to the reasons for the choice of content. The entire information distribution circuit is delegated to a complex and secret machine whose effectiveness offers high advertising earnings because it manages to hold the attention of its users for a long time. And this innovation is in the process of becoming the norm.

Social media apps such as Facebook and Instagram already pose serious problems for access to quality information. Their current models mix social interactions and curation algorithms to select posts and display them on users’ newsfeeds. The role they play in distributing and ranking content on the accounts users choose to follow is already problematic because it reduces the visibility of journalistic content, as RSF has pointed out. A Washington Post article in September 2021 reported that disinformation was six times more visible than informative content during the US presidential election.

The way TikTok works is now posing new problems. Disinformation continues to represent an economic interest for the major social media platforms. In the future, each platform could have its own disinformation universe, one tailor-made by an artificial intelligence. This has already been seen since the start of the war in Ukraine where, as in Kenya, TikTok has established itself as a new champion of disinformation.

Alok Sharma hints he could quit if new UK PM is ‘weak’ on net zero agenda

Cop26 president urges Tory candidates to stick to carbon pledges

 EPA.

Neil Murphy
Jul 16, 2022

The British cabinet minister who led last year’s landmark UN climate change summit in Glasgow has indicated he could resign if the next prime minister is not fully committed to the net zero agenda.

Cop26 president Alok Sharma said that while it was “absolutely a leadership issue”, some of the remaining candidates in the Tory leadership race had been only “lukewarm”.

In an interview with The Observer, he urged them to “proactively” set out their support for the net zero agenda and “green” growth.

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Alok Sharma warns scrapping net zero would take UK's Conservatives on ‘road to nowhere’

“Anyone aspiring to lead our country needs to demonstrate that they take this issue incredibly seriously, that they’re willing to continue to lead and take up the mantle that Boris Johnson started off,” he said.

Asked if he could resign if candidates were weak on net zero, Mr Sharma said: “Let’s see, shall we? I think we need to see where the candidates are. And we need to see who actually ends up in No 10.

“I hope every candidate realises why this is so important for voters generally and why it’s important for Conservative supporters. And I hope that we will see, particularly with the final two, a very clear statement that this is an agenda that they do support.”

Pressed a second time, he added: “I don’t rule anything out and I don’t rule anything in.”

Of the five remaining candidates in the contest, only Kemi Badenoch has said she does not support the UK target of getting to net zero emissions by 2050, describing it as “unilateral economic disarmament”.

The others have indicated varying degrees of enthusiasm for the policy, which is unpopular with some sections of the party amid concerns about the impact on the economy.

On Friday, Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said she would impose a temporary moratorium on the green levy on domestic energy bills, arguing there were better ways to achieve the net zero target.

U.S. soprano pulls out of Italian opera over theater's use of blackface: "Outright racist"

JULY 16, 2022 / 8:58 PM / AP

Soprano Angel Blue says she won't perform in an opera in Italy this month because blackface was used in the staging of a different work this summer on the same stage.

The U.S. singer posted a note on her angeljoyblue Instagram page saying she will be bowing out of "La Traviata" at Verona's Arena this month because the theater recently mounted another Giuseppe Verdi opera, "Aida," that had performers in blackface.

She blasted such use of "archaic" theatrical practices as "offensive, humiliating, and outright racist."


Angel Blue, however, was still listed Saturday on the Arena's website as singing the role of Violetta in "La Traviata" on July 22 and 30.

The theater said it was hoping that Blue, who is Black, would accept an invitation to meet with Arena officials in a "dialogue" over the issue. The Arena, in a statement Friday, said it had "no reason nor intent whatsoever to offend and disturb anyone's sensibility."

Angel Blue performs during a rehearsal of "Fire Shut Up in My Bones" at the Metropolitan Opera, on Sept. 24, 2021, in New York. 

JASON DECROW/AP

For decades, U.S. civil rights organizations for decades have publicly condemned blackface - in which white performers blacken their faces - as dehumanizing Blacks by introducing and reinforcing racial stereotypes.


The Arena this summer has mounted performances of "Aida" based on a 2002 staging of the opera classic by Italian director Franco Zeffirelli who died in 2019. That staging uses blackface.

"Dear Friends, Family, and Opera Lovers," began the soprano's Instagram post. "I have come to the unfortunate conclusion that I will not be singing La Traviata at Arena di Verona this summer as planned."

Referring to Arena's decision to use blackface makeup in "Aida,'' the singer wrote: "Let me be perfectly clear: the use of blackface under any circumstances, artistic or otherwise, is a deeply misguided practice based on archaic theatrical traditions which have no place in modern society. It is offensive, humiliating and outright racist."

She wrote that she couldn't "in good conscience associate myself with an institution which continues this practice."



The theater's statement said "Angel Blue knowingly committed herself to sing at the Arena" even though the "characteristics" of the 2002 Zeffirelli staging were "well known."

Still, the theater stressed its hope that her protest would ultimately improve understanding between cultures as well as educate Italian audiences.

"Every country has different roots, and their cultural and social structures developed along different historical and cultural paths,'' said the statement by the Arena of Verona Foundation. "Common convictions have often been reached only after years of dialogue and mutual understanding."

The Arena statement stressed dialogue, "in effort to understand others' point of view, in respect of consciously assumed artistic obligations."

"Contraposition, judgments, labeling, lack of dialogue only feed the culture of contrasts, which we totally reject," said the statement, appealing for cooperation "to avoid divisions."

It's not the first time that the use of blackface makeup for a staging of "Aida" in Verona has sparked a soprano's protest. In 2019, opera singer Tamara Wilson, who is white, protested against darkening her face to sing the title character of an Ethiopian woman in the opera at the Arena.