Hold Me Tight: 24,000 screws used for Beatles art

The portrait is made up of 24,000 screws of three different colours

An artist has created an image of The Beatles using more than 24,000 screws.

Darren Timby, a graphic designer from Sunderland, spent about 120 hours making the portrait of George Harrison, John Lennon, Ringo Starr and Paul McCartney.

He said his decision to use screws was a way to pay homage to his hometown's roots as an industrial city.

"Ship building and coal mining are all part of our history and the screw art is almost like a nod to where I’m from," he said.

The artwork is made of black, silver and gold-coloured screws on a white canvas.

The four different tones allowed Mr Timby to create enough depth so that viewers could make out the subjects.

He said he picked the image of The Beatles to copy and then worked out a "sensible size" for the artwork - which ended up being 6ft wide by 3ft tall (182cm by 91cm).

Darren Timby has created 12 portraits of people including Elvis, Amy Winehouse and Queen Elizabeth II

"I know there are some really iconic images of them, such as them walking over the zebra crossing on Abbey Road, but to do that I would need a factory wall to produce the right quality," he said.

Mr Timby said he had particular fun making the microphones and guitar head seen in the foreground of his picture.

"They were things that were not in the photo I picked – but I added them to give some depth to the piece rather than having a load of shirt pockets and shoulders in there," he added.

This is the 12th screw creation Mr Timby has made.

His other works include portraits of Elvis, Amy Winehouse, the Gallagher brothers and Queen Elizabeth II.

He said he often plays soundtracks associated with the artists he is depicting and listened to an original Beatles LP while he created his latest portrait.

"I just lose myself in the whole thing," he said.