Dutch entrepreneur to preserve tattoos of the dead

Tattoo shop owner Peter van der Helm

A Dutch entrepreneur has set up a business to preserve the tattoos of the dead. Hirschfeld and about 30 other clients each paid a few hundred euros and have donated their skin to a company called "Walls and Skin" tattoo parlour in a will.

When they die a Dutch pathologist will remove the tattoo and freeze or package it in formaldehyde, ideally within 48 hours. It will then be sent to a laboratory outside the Netherlands, where a 12-week procedure extracts water and replaces it with silicone, leaving a rubbery substance. Hirschfeld's tattoos cover his body from the neck down. "Some people are so important to me I always want to carry them with me and this way I can," said Hirschfeld, whose mother died of cancer.

Van der Helm said he was mainly inspired by the idea of preserving the best works by skilful tattoo artists.

"Vincent van Gogh was a poor man when he died. You and me can't buy a Van Gogh," he said. "Tattooing is the people's form of art."

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