Since around 14% of Americans today are tattooed, it's become more and more acceptable to get inked, find a job and live your life as a walking art piece. And, as with any deemed-acceptable social norm, more extreme versions find their way into popularity.

London-based body modification artist Yann Brenyak takes tattooing to a whole new level by carving skin away from all-black tattoos to create artistic scar tissue. You heard that right.

Although it's a technique originated by the Maori, he takes it a step further by "giving a client a sleeve of ink before the artist carves a silhouetted image into the tattoo with a scalpel. The resulting art, often portraits of human faces, looks like an inverse tattoo, completed through skin splitting, peeling, carving, and removal,​" according to his profile on Vice Magazine. ?

Out of respect for the faint of heart, only near-complete pieces will be shown in this post, but if you need to know what ~really goes down~ here's an uncensored video of a tattoo/scarring in action.

Before you go run out to get some of your skin removed, according to Thomas Mathews, a Cardiovascular Specialist in Washington, D.C., getting your body modified in this way comes with its own special, unique and sometimes terrifying set of risks.

The scar tissue resulting from getting one of these tattoos can continue to grow for years after getting your body modified, leaving the tattoo obscured, lumpy or unrecognizable after a while.

There's also the very real risk of a clot resulting from some of that scar tissue traveling through your blood stream to your lungs, your liver and even your heart.

That being said, getting a more conventional tattoo also carries it's own health risks -- although they're much safer to get in the long-run.

If you want to read more about Brenyak's adventures in body modification, read the full report on Vice.