Pins ‘n’ peel: This banana art will blow your mind

We don’t know about you guys, but when we were kids our parents always told us not to play with our food. Judging by the number of “banana tattoo” photos doing the rounds on Twitter today however, it looks like there are plenty of people here in Japan prepared to ignore that particular piece of parental advice in the name of art.

Banana tattoos have been around for a while now, but we’ve never seen levels of dedication quite like this.

For the uninitiated, banana tattooing is just as it sounds, albeit without the ink. Using little more than a drawing pin (or thumb-tack if you’d rather), it’s possible to discolour the skin of a banana simply by pricking it with the pin (it works even better if the banana has been refrigerated), thus “tattooing” its surface and allowing you to draw whatever patterns you like.

It would appear that Japan’s netizens – particularly one artist going by the name of “End Cape” – are surprisingly adept at this unusual art form, however. Take a look at these fine examples of pictures in peel!

▼ It would be a shame to eat this thing!