In 1992 the book Els tatuatges dels fang de l’Africa occidental: Art, simbolisme i biologia en una manifestació artística poc coneguda was published by Jordi Sabater i Pi and J. Sabater i Coca.
The book includes several drawings made ex-profeso in Chinese ink, with the face as the central motif and the tattoo on the left side drawn in an exempt way. These are not very informed drawings and, as in all the phases, the collection of data is prioritized over any type of narrative. In the words of Sabater i Pi: “… we chose to make the reproductions following the originals, always located on the right side of the plate, the outline of the tattoo located on the left side and accompanied by a documentary record containing the ethnographic data known about the subject under study.”
This quote belongs to the text of the Sabaters (father and son) that was included in the publication on tattoos, which emphasizes their “artistry” and expresses a well-intentioned desire to disseminate this culture in order to preserve it.
Perhaps it is the result of a nostalgia for the colony that, as Gustau Nerin points out, took place in the 1990s, accompanied by the publication of books on Equatorial Guinea that are full of memories.
In the 1992 text, along with the intention of knowing the indigenous people, phrases such as this one slip in: “In those years the Fang or Pamues indigenous people of the interior, many of them not yet Europeanized…”.
