A tattoo artist is transforming mastectomy patients’ chests - and lives - by tattooing 3D nipples onto their breasts.
Mark Corliss, a tattooist from Massachusetts, taught himself how to create the tattoos after a cancer survivor asked him to cover her scars with nipples instead of a floral design.
Since then, he has tattooed more than 200 patients.
He recently discovered that some parlours charged women up to $800 (£640) to tattoo just one nipple and, in a passionate Instagram post, he called out tattooists who charge them “ridiculous” sums of money to feel whole again.
Corliss said that any tattooer who “knows their stuff” knows what it takes to tattoo a nipple onto a breast.
“It’s far from an 800 dollar service,” he wrote on Instagram. “I’ve done hundreds of sets for free and it takes around an hour and a half to do a set, never mind one.
“Please help me share this so it goes viral. These woman should not have to pay a ridiculous fee to feel whole again.”
His Instagram post has been liked more than 2,000 times and has received an influx of positive comments.
“Thank you for what you do for the survivors,” one of his followers wrote.
“You are incredible,” another added.
Corliss said giving back through his work is incredibly rewarding.
He told BuzzFeed: “I love to put a smile on the face of someone who has been on a long, sad journey, and you can’t explain the feeling you get when you give someone back something they lost.”