An artist has constructed “the most expensive papier mache sculpture ever made” after unwittingly using vintage Avengers comics worth up to £50,000 as his building materials.

Andrew Vickers thought it was his lucky day when he spotted a box on a skip overflowing with comics from the 1960s. He thought the old issues of The Avengers would help create a 6ft sculpture for a superheroes exhibition in Sheffield.

It was only when comic expert Steve Eyre saw the statue – by now dipped in glaze – that he realised the situation.

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Unaware of what he was destroying, Mr Vickers started at the top of the pile he found in the Sheffield skip. The end result is The Paper Boy – a sculpture worth no more than £500.

Mr Eyre thought the total cost of the comics was at least £30,000 but could be as high as £50,000. He said: “On the inside right leg there was a cover of Avengers number one. I’ve got a copy of that, worth well over £10,000. Then I started looking, there are six comics that together would be worth, even in the condition you can see, £20,000. As a collector it does not bear thinking about.”