A British man who has been frequenting tattoo parlors for the past ten years has been going viral over the degree to which he's managed to modify his body. He goes by the name Eli Ink, and to say that he's inked up would be a gross understatement. At 17-years-old Eli Ink was your average white kid out of Brighton, England. Now he is 27, and his entire body is black.
To the determination of many Eli Ink is the walking embodiment of cultural appropriation. There is a huge subculture of people like Eli who identify as 'Modern Primitives.' They co-opt customs from places in Africa, Asia, and South America that have for thousands of years used piercing and tattooing in a right-of-passage. Eli, for example, has stretched ears and nostrils that he fills with metals, stones, and other adornments. Even his bottom lip has been worked to fit a plate in much the same way that the Mursi and Surma people of Ethiopia do throughout their lives.
While the modifications that people on the continent get are viewed as ritual, however, the tattoos and piercings Eli has gotten are being more and more widely appreciated as art. And it is an art that he takes very seriously. He's even gotten the whites of his eyes tatted via a procedure that involves injecting ink between the conjunctiva and sclera sections of the eyeball. The procedure is considered highly risky, but it was a risk that Eli Ink was eager to take.
