Wake up and paint with coffee: Artist creates portraits using nothing but stains on the bottom of a mug

An artist has created an uncanny portrait 'painting' using nothing but coffee and a mug.

Hong Yi used Nescafe coffee stains from the bottom of a cup to depict Taiwanese song-writer Jay Chou on a 3ft by 5.5ft canvas, after becoming 'inspired' by one of his songs.

She has experimented with a variety of different media to create artwork in the past, which include sunflower seeds, chilli paste, and basketballs.

Ground breaking: Hong Yi shows her painting of Taiwanese song-writer Jay Chou. She was 'inspired' by one of his songs

Despite using such unconventional methods, Hong Yi, 25, from Malaysia, has honed in her art skills to produce portraits almost exactly alike to the original photographs.

She has spent the last year dabbling in art after completing an architecture degree and is now working for an architecture firm in Shanghai, where she creates different projects in her spare time.

'This project was inspired by the opening and closing lines of one of my favourite songs by Jay Chou called Secret,' she said.

'The opening line is about a coffee cup being lifted off the saucer, which is why I've used coffee cup stains as my medium in this project.The ending of the song is about autumn leaves and fragmented pieces, which is shown through the portrait as a whole how it’s formed by many individual rings, many of them broken and imperfect like fallen autumn leaves.

She used coffee stains from the bottom of a cup, saying it was 'tricky' and took a few tries to perfect the method

'I diluted the coffee for the lighter shades and used very little water for the darker tones.

'It was a tricky medium to use at first, and it took me a few tries to get it right as too much water and the rings do not form easily; they tend to bleed into each other and results in just a pool of coffee.

'I then had to wait for the painting to dry up to do the darker areas.

'Most people were surprised and intrigued by why I used such a medium and some people even told me to 'go buy some paintbrushes instead,' but I really want to challenge art as it is done conventionally.

Hong Yi said she started drawing two years ago during a university break when she did a sketch of singer Justin Beiber.

'I didn't have any paint or paint brushes with me, so I opened the fridge and got a bottle of Korean chilli paste instead, and drew on a plate. That was when my interest in working with unusual media started.

'I believe we need to break routines sometimes and bend rules a bit, do we really have to stick to painting on cartridge paper? What if I feel like painting on my plate, table, shoe?

'It is my hope that my work has sparked an interest in art, especially for people who usually don't pay any attention to it, and I really hope that it inspires people to try new things, to question and to test their boundaries.'

Hong Yi's portraits are almost exactly alike to the original photographs