Tattooed Japanese defy social taboo that links skin art to criminality, and hope inked foreign athletes at Tokyo Olympics spur acceptance

Tattoo artist Shodai Horiren, 52, at work in her studio in Warabi, Saitama prefecture, Japan. Tattooed from head to foot herself, she is one in every of a rising variety of Japanese who’ve defied the normal affiliation of tattoos with crime. Picture: Reuters/Kim Kyung-Hoon