Although views on tattoos were at their most putrid levels in the early 1990s, plenty of people were still basking in ink. With the popular misconception that the art of tattoo was reserved for the lowest of lowest in society – like criminals, low-lives, circus folks and ladies of the night – folks who were neither of the aforementioned opted to hide their marked skins. Little did they know that, almost a millennia later, crowds of people would be standing in front of a museum display ogling over their tattooed skins.
The MUDE museum in Lisbon, Portugal, proudly debuted “O Mais Profundo é a Pele” (translated into “The Deepest Thing is Skin”), an exhibit displaying 61 crystal encasements of tattooed human skin from people of the early 1900s with bios to go along with each skin of the person who once bore the tattoo.
Exhibit window for “O Mais Profundo é a Pele” at MUDE in Lisbon. Photo: MUDE/Facebook.