SKIN''S TRANSCENDENCIES It doesn''t so much conceal the body as reveal it. Exposes even as it protects. Skin is what is most us, and yet it confirms the appearance of others. A hypersensitive nucleus, it accumulates aggressions. Spreads caresses. And seems condemned to exaggerate. It''s said to take up about four kilos and two square meters of infinity. Besides constituting a single ever-present organ, skin possesses absolute memory, like hearing damaged by every frequency It recalls, every day with vengeful rancor.
As such it represents a kind of anatomical divinity. That''s why we worship it. Skin exchanges liquids, toxins, intuitions and feelings with the outside world. It lives pushing up against its limits. Thanks to this insistence, we know that pain and pleasure are surface depths, plunges into the realm of the now. That there are no such things as cold or hot, only skins that seek protection or dive in. Studied under the lens, it looks like a nautical rope, perhaps because it is born anticipating the storms of age. In its elderly stages, its dryness flakes off particles of experience; every blotch acquires an Altamira quality.
At the opposite extreme, baby skin almost melts between our fingers and performs a small miracle: it''s the person touching who feels tickled. A silky skin will enchant us with its gift-wrap shine, and yet its slippery nature will tend to make it evade us. A rough skin permits more of a hold, its territories favorable to the rapidity of touch. Greasy ones let themselves be kneaded with a bread-maker''s patience. They permit rolls, folds, and all kinds of pinching. Sweaty ones emerge at the speed of grapes under water. A lack of prestige has obstructed their generosity, which allows our dirtiness to be confused with theirs. Adding another layer to its story, tattooed skin is proud of being founded anew.
Some specialists call it meta-skin. With regard to skin color, political blindness often eclipses optical reality. Isn''t it ridiculous to propose the hegemony of the palest color, the least remarkable on the chromatic spectrum? The gift of a fair skin comes from light passing through it, illuminating the veins. That of a dark skin lies in the fact that it absorbs that same light, emphasizing its contours. Others shine depending on the time of day: olive skins glow in the evening, when the sun becomes earth; pale ones are thankful for mornings and their egg-yolk sheen. Capitalism has been quick to exploit these changes in tone, from obsessive whitening treatments to ultra-violet singeing. Nobody can be unaware of the abyss between the pigmentation of an afro model or a hip-hop star and that of any immigrant. Lightness also has its gradations.
Malnourished pallor, student paleness, and the whiteness preserved beneath a parasol will never be the same. Possibly the worst impropriety is to reduce skin to its uppermost layer. Which is, in dermatological parlance, anecdotal when it comes to its structure. If we turn to a longitudinal diagram, it may seem disconcerting: a mattress with springs of hair protruding; an aquarium stocked with psychedelic algae; a tranquil cereal floor. Let''s take a closer look at these three layers. The epidermis exposes the accidents of identity. Some fanatics claim they could see hierarchies in its melanin levels, changing prejudices into essences. Not even skin can avoid self-deception.
As well as being thicker, the dermis enjoys more sensations. It is in this layer that one finds connective or social tissue. This explains the proliferation of working glands and elastic concentrations. Nervous actions and bloody vessels. Blows and injuries. In short, everything we are at our deepest level. The dense deposits of the hypodermis contain another kind of energy. The weightiest provisions.
A larder for all, as adamant as a provincial granny. In its domains, no posing is possible; pure candor is what rules here. Fat. Life. Truth. Skin''s pathologies conquer us pore by pore. They work on our susceptibilities until they provoke self-harming lesions. Clinical studies carried out by the most painstaking poets demonstrate that dermatitis is an inclination; urticaria, a never-ending blush; herpes, a return of the phantom; psoriasis, a performance of anxiety; vitiligo, an emergent forgetting; and acne, a crisis over the passage of time.
And it is time that imprints its interest in skin like a Morse code. Dots, lines. Joys, fears. We celebrate and are afraid of these messages. We narrate the plot of every blotch. We fly over archipelagos of birthmarks. And occasionally, holding our breath, we put our trust in the ellipsis of a removal. It would be as well to ask oneself whether there are wounds in skin or if, viewed historically, skin is a moving wound.
From the trench separating past battles from present survival, scars answer the call.