Check Out These Boob Self-Portraits

We all know there are some universal boob-truths, like the importance of breast self-exams or the fact that nothing is better than taking your bra off at the end of the day. But it's also true that every woman has her own unique relationship with her breasts, which is especially evident when you ask women to draw their boobs. And as it happens, that's just what New York Magazine's The Cut asked women in New York to do, along with writing a sentence explaining how they feel about their boobs. (The images are just line drawings, but they might be NSFW, depending on where you work).

"We heard stories of breast cancer, breastfeeding, and what it’s like to become a double D in elementary school," the Cut says of the experiment. "Women drew their scars, big nipples, or barely there boobs. They offered advice, wrote what they love about themselves or why they wished for something else."

And overall, the whole project is pretty great. It includes drawings from women aged 17 to 72, showing off not only the diversity of breasts out there but also the diversity around how women feel about the particular pair of breasts that they wound up with. Because in truth, we all have our own opinions about these odd, squishy things attached to our chests.

All too often, women aren't really given the chance to express our possibly very complicated feelings about our bodies, or to provide our own perspective on our bodies. Female bodies in our society are often treated as though they exist purely for the aesthetic, and as though they must conform to a very particular aesthetic at that. It's a pervasive and harmful cultural norm, and it's always great to see people pushing back against it, whether it's using real, untouched photographs, or women's own drawings. Any time women get a chance to express ourselves about our bodies is pretty cool.

Some of the drawings in this series are simple, some are detailed. Some of the women love their boobs, some of them would change them if they could. But all of them have something to say.

You can see even more photos from the series at the Cut.

Images: Courtesy of The Cut (5)