“I draw on cups. Yes.”

Cheeming Boey does astonishing, finely detailed artwork on white Styrofoam coffee cups.

For most, he draws freehand with only a black Sharpie pen. For others, he does painstaking pointillism. But for a very few, he engraves the cup with a tool gentler than a toothpick, making an almost invisible image. Then, sometimes, titles it after old Depeche Mode lyrics. Some of his cups have been plunged 10,000 feet below sea level, where they shrivel up like Shrinkey Dinks but never lose their appeal. Boey's work beats back the idea that Styrofoam is a non-biodegradable menace by making it beautiful enough to be, well, indispensable.

Images after the jump, and on Boey's flickr page and website.