What shouldn't surprise you to learn about 2017's Miss Inked Australia winner Sarah Gray - considering the title - is that she is covered in tattoos. What might surprise you - given how much our preconceptions about people rely on superficial stereotypes - is that Gray is, in fact, training to become a surgeon.
Indeed, the 31-year-old works as an intern at a hospital in Adelaide, and is an aspiring orthopaedic surgeon. A self-described art collector (the art in question being her many tattoos), Gray got her first tattoo at the age of 15 and has been hooked on them ever since.
This woman spent £10k on body modifications which included getting eyeballs tattoos:"It definitely wasn’t a thought-out process like they are today," she told scenestr.com.au. "It was one of those spontaneous decisions you make when you’re young and silly – you don’t really think about the consequences when you do them. Now I’m what you’d consider a collector; I pursue an artist for their specific style and get them to do a piece for me."
The tattoo enthusiast is now hoping to shatter all the taboos and stereotypes placed on those who - like her - have a penchant for tattoos. And she has spoken out against the sort of profiling that heavily inked people receive on a daily basis.
In an interview on an Australian morning show, Sunrise, she said: "I find it's a good talking point, especially a lot of the younger generation of patients that we see, I guess its a bit of a barrier break-down between what it is traditionally thought a doctor would look like."
This guy woke up after a bachelor party with a hilarious Donald Trump tattoo:"If you're confident and competent at your job it shouldn't really matter what you look like. I'm just trying to advocate for being your own person and still being able to work in the medical profession."
She added: "I don't have anything offensive on me anywhere, I think everything is done really well, and I think there's a real difference between getting a tattoo that's of poor quality and getting a tattoo if you're an art collector like myself."
