Think peanuts are only good for making you fat, giving you acne breakouts, and getting bottled with jelly (and, sometimes, chili) into a delicious spread? With a little creativity, they make for excellent art pieces, too. Case in point: these Peanut Sculptures.
Made by artist Steve Casino, the tiny sculptures are made from peanut shells with the contents removed before being glued back together and sanded to prep them for painting over. He equips each of the peanuts with sticks for legs and arms, as well as various media for other accessories, then sets them up on a base to get them standing upright.
Once he’s built the figures, he then paints over each one, turning the peanuts into miniature likenesses of various characters. When finished, each piece is bathed in a finish of polyurethane coating for strength and longevity. He’s produced a large variety of the miniature figures, which include comic book characters (Spiderman, Batman, Wonder Woman), film and TV characters (Addams Family, Star Trek, Frankenstein, James Bond), musicians (Bono, Elton John) and more.
Aside from the finish figures, Steve also does commission work, so you can request Peanut Sculptures of anyone you want, from the Planters Mr. Peanut dude to Snoopy and the cast of Peanuts to your nutty mother in law. Each sculpture is shipped with a display case to further keep damage away when you show them off at your desk in the office.
Pricing for the Peanut Sculptures start at $175, but that quickly adds up depending on the kind of paint job and accessories (hair, musical instruments, extra limbs) thrown in.