Bling gone Mad: The World's Weirdest Jewelry

Fine jewelry is made from precious metals and stones and is worn as a way to show off a person's beauty and status. Costume jewelry can be made from a variety of materials such as paste, plastic, glass and non-precious metals. Over the past few decades, jewelry designers have been expanding their horizons by creating jewelry pieces that use bizarre and creepy materials.

Bling that Bites: Human Teeth Jewelry
Ever wondered what the tooth fairy does with all those teeth? Polly van der Glas creates jewelry using real human teeth, positioning the teeth in such a way that they seem to be set in the metal the same way they had once been set in gums, in someone's mouth.

Above: Human teeth make an unusual addition to body jewelry. [source]

Roadkill Rings are a Creative use of Crushed Critters
April Hale uses road kill as a material for her creepy creations. After sketching the dead animals, Hale skins and cleans the bodies and then creates jewelry out of the fur. Each piece of jewelry is designed to best show off the color and texture of the roadkill's fur.

Above: April Hale shows off her furry creations. The rings are made from the skins of animals killed in road accidents. [source]

Hair-Raising Jewelry
Kerry Howley uses human hair to create patterned necklaces. Instead of creating individual loops to create a chain, Howley has instead designed lace-like human hair jewelry. The jewelry range is called attraction/aversion. The artist claims that she wanted to make people feel both attraction and aversion simultaneously, which is why she has used discarded human hair in a decorative manner.

Above: One of Kerry Howley's human hair jewelry creations. [source]

Decorated Maquech Beetles are Living Jewelry

Some Mexican jewelry designers are continuing the tradition of decorating maquech beetles with precious metals and gems. The beetles are then worn as a living brooch, tethered to a person's clothing with a short leash that is also made of a precious metal such as gold or silver.

Above: A maquech beetle decorated with gold and precious stones. The beetles are very docile, making them ideal subjects for living jewelry. [source]

Lending a Hand: the Barbie Bracelet

Margaux Lange creates jewelry out of dolls, namely Barbie dolls. She hacks the dolls into bits, and then re-uses the parts for her creations. Hands, mouths, eyes, even the body parts find a place in Lange's jewelry creations.

Above: A Margaux Lange creation that uses several Barbie hands for decoration. [source]

A Squeaky Taxidermy Pendant

Taxidermy jewelry is becoming more and more popular. Whether the creatures used are insects, sea animals, mammals or birds, taxidermy jewelry is fascinatingly macabre. The eyes of taxidermy creatures are generally replaced with glass, but for taxidermy jewerly, the eyes can also be replaced with semi-precious stones or gems.

Above: This mouse head taxidermy pendant is completed with black decorations that highlight the white fur of the dead mouse. [source]

Read More on Art-Sci:

Antique Lolcat Photographs make Kitteh Historeh
Blooming Bling! Jewelry made with Real Flowers
Fan Art Character Hybrids
Funny Photoshop Animals are Almost Human
Hundreds of Mummies Discovered in Mexican Graves
Trollface Gets Immortalized in Art

Meow! Cats with Tattoos or Tattoos of Cats?

There seems to be skin-deep relationship between cats and tattoos. There are hundreds of cat tattoo designs available, and it would seem, hundreds of cats with tattoos.

Tattoos of Cats

Cat tattoo designs are not uncommon in the world of skin ink. This popular pet has found its way into a variety of different tattoo styles, from photorealism to funny. Tattoos of cats often have a personal meaning to the owner of the tattoo; sometimes it is a treasured pet, a favorite cartoon character or simply the symbolism of cats. The symbolism of cats varies from one culture to the next, though broadly speaking, cats symbolize hunting, guardianship and a relationship with the night or darkness.
Cats can be humorous creatures, as proven by the popular website, LOLcats. Their curiosity, attitude and often playful nature make them a popular choice for tattoo designs.

Tattoos on Cats

Sphynx cats are a hairless breed of cat. In the Austin Powers movies, Dr Evil is depicted as owning a sphynx cat, which is as bald as he is. Because of the hairless nature of their skin, sphynx cats are now becoming a prime canvas for tattoo artists. Is this animal cruelty, or is it art? Read Animal Owners Tattoo Their Pets for more information on tattooing animals. You can read more about animal tattooing in Animal Owners Tattoo their Pets.

Above: This is Mickey, a rare Canadian Hairless cat, who lives in Moscow, Russia. Mickey’s owner had him sedated for three hours while an image of King Tut was tattooed onto his chest.

Above: Tattooing animals is becoming quite a trend in Russia, as there are few laws and regulations surrounding the treatment of animals.

Above: Like owner, like cat. Although cats are sedated when they being tattooed, animal rights groups believe that the act of tattooing animals is cruel.

Above: Tattooed sphynx cat being shown off by its owner at a tattoo festival. Unlike their human owners, cats don’t get to choose their tattoo designs. They also don’t get to choose whether they want a tattoo or not.

Human Cat Hybrids

As with all art forms, there are those who always take things one step too far. Several people have taken body modification to a new level, turning themselves in human animal hybrids. These body modification fanatics use tattoos, piercings, inserts and plastic surgery to transform their once-human bodies into a bizarre creature composites. Although several animals are used as the inspiration for body modification processes such as these, cats seem to be the most popular. None of the following images are photoshopped.

Read More on Art-Sci:

10 Postmodern Appearances of The Mona Lisa

Animal Owners Tattoo Their Pets

Contraceptive Fashion: Condom Clothing
Funny Underwater Photographs of Dogs Swimming

Mythological Creatures Displayed in Japanese Museum

The Art of Living Plant Sculpture

Animal Owners Tattoo Their Pets

Is tattooing an animal inhumane, or is it art? Animal Rights lobbyists exclaim in horror as animals receive decorative tattoos from their owners, claiming that animals can’t choose whether or not to not have the tattoos done.

Identification Tattoos

Owners of rare or valuable pets have the option to tag their pets with an identification tattoo. The marking deters theft, and if the pet is found, the code can be traced back to the owner of the animal. The tattoo allows a person to know who the breeder of the animal is and the litter number that the animal came from, which authenticates the lineage of the animal. These tattoos are performed while the animal is under anaesthetic, at a young age.

This dog has a Hello Kitty tattoo on its belly, apparently for identification purposes. The dog was tattooed by its owner, while under anesthetic. The actual tattooing process wasn’t particularly cruel, but now this poor pooch must live in Hello Kitty hell, unable to lift its leg in public for fear of other dogs seeing the abominably cutesy cat face.

Tattooed Fish

Do fish have feelings? Hopes? Dreams? Would they approve of having hearts, spots and stripes tattooed onto them in garish pinks, greens and blues?
Who knows? Unless we find fish whisperers to talk to the little guys and ask them their opinion; tattooed fish will continue to be a lame fad for tasteless consumers.

Imported from Singapore and Hong Kong, these tattooed mollies are making their way into fish tanks across the globe. The actual process of the inking is unclear. Some say the fish are sucked into a clear tube and then tattooed with a laser, other say the fish are tattooed in the traditional needle and ink method.

Do fish feel pain, or are they just a vegetable that moves? The ink is only scale deep, so it is debatable whether the fish are hurt in any way.

Tattooed Pigs

Yet more appalled shrieks from animal lovers, as Belgian tattoo artist Wim Delvoye decorates living pigs with permanent tattoos.

Delvoye says, “I tattoo pigs because they grow fast and they are so much better to tattoo than fish. I tattoo them when they are young and I like the way the artwork stretches and distorts over time. Essentially, we invest in small tattoos and we harvest large paintings.” See full interview here.

The pigs live a peaceful lifestyle on an art farm in China, free to roam and forage for food. Previously destined for the slaughterhouse, these pigs have a full, happy life ahead of them in return for the tattoos on their skin, which are harvested after their death. The pigs are tattooed whilst sedated, and may not even be aware of their own markings.

Animal Rights groups wish to stop unnecessary cruelty towards animals. But is it really so cruel to trade a slaughterhouse death for a few tattoos and a tranquil life on a farm?

Although tattooing animals is not a common practice, it has become a fad amongst tasteless fashion mongers. One can only wonder at the fact that there are laws against children being tattooed, yet there are no laws against the tattooing of animals. Should this practice be illegal or not? 

More on tattooed animals in Meow! Cats with Tattoos or Tattoos of Cats?

Read More on Art-Sci:

 10 Where's Waldo Puzzles

 Artworks Whose Eyes Follow You Around the Room

 Funny Pictures of Dogs Shaking off Water

 Paintings by Elephants

 Rubik's Cubes Twist and Turn into Artworks

 Street Art goes Skin Deep with Graffiti Tattoos