This coffee art will blow your mind
Intricate, magical and whimsical. Those aren't exactly the words you'd use to describe a coffee stain.
But Guilia Bernardelli's coffee and food "stains" just so happen to look like wondrous creations straight out of a Disney film.
The 28-year-old Italian artist, who hails from Mantua, a small city in the north of Italy, says she has long been interested in artistic endeavours.
"I grew up in my dad's bookshop and art gallery, I studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Bologna and I am currently employed at a museum, where I work on projects for children."
Bernardelli began sharing her creations on Instagram and received an outpouring of positive feedback, where she now boasts more than 43,000 followers.
Not only does she create unique artworks from coffee or chocolate stains, she also uses everyday ingredients and objects around her from which she draws inspiration.
"I have always been fascinated by colours, compositions, details, and through practice I have acquired good manual skills," she says.
"Everything that I needed was around me, if I looked carefully: I decided to replace the paint brush with what nature offered, such as leaves, fruit skins, food.
"All these elements feature different colours and textures."
Many of Bernardelli's creations are made spontaneously.
"I never plan my creations in advance, I simply follow my instinct, based on the actions I perform," she sayd.
"For instance, when I drink coffee I start thinking of the nuances it would create if I dropped it on the table. At breakfast, I imagine a cat's paws treading on jam and leaving footprints."
As for the coffee stain creations? They were born through accident.
"I started [to] use coffee by chance. Less than a year ago, I accidentally knocking over a cup of coffee and suddenly appeared a new world, made of beautiful shades, one different from the other," she says.
"In my photos I try to catch the magic of a moment, as if the coffee created a story by toppling."
Bernardelli says one of the most essential things about her creations is their temporary nature.
"They are eaten and they therefore disappear. After I create an artwork, I take a picture, and this becomes the perfect end result. This is how the artwork is captured at its best, in the moment of final wonder."