A couple of years ago, Nashville, Tennessee-based photographer Brian Batista started taking pictures of rescue dogs with tattooed humans — and not just because they look decidedly awesome together.
He’d started “seeing the correlation” between how people treat homeless animals — especially those whose heads have a certain kind of blocky shape — and how they treat folks who sport a lot of ink.
“Some of the things people would say when they would see a heavily tattooed person walking with a pit bull for example were just absolutely ridiculous,” says Batista. “They would have memorial tattoos of family members, art they loved, tattoos that tell stories of their lives and be walking with the happiest dogs you have ever seen. And people would yell at them saying ‘That dog is a killer! Stay away from my family!'”
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Check out more of Brian Batista’s Tattoos & Rescues photo series on his website, where you can also find information about buying prints of the pictures.
And get in touch at arin.greenwood@huffingtonpost.com if you have an animal story to share!
