All About That Bush: 18 Photos Prove Natural Is Beautiful (NSFW)

It had its heyday in the '60s and '70s, but natural female pubic hair has since fallen out of favor. So much so that, apparently, there are now sexually-active hetero men who say they've never seen it. To celebrate the neglected bush, artist Marilyn Minter spent six months photographing it, asking "all kinds of women, [with] different hair colours, different textures, different skin colours" to grow out their natural hair down there and bare it for her camera. The photographs Minter took are collected in her first book, Plush.

"Over the last decade, pubic hair has all but disappeared in popular culture (which is fine)," Minter explains to us, "but I became interested in showing beautiful images of pubes as an alternative perspective. I suspect the no-fur trend might be a fashion, so I wanted to remind younger generations that fashion is fleeting, but laser is forever. Do whatever you want — just don't laser!"

The 70 full-colour images in Plush make an eloquent visual argument against lasering — and maybe even against shaving. Sensuous and unabashed, they're perhaps the most powerful interpretation of "Long hair, don't care" we've ever seen. In Minter's words, "Bush is beautiful. Bring it back!" Click through for 18 of the most striking photographs from the book.