One of my favorite kinds of painting that I learned about in my Art History studies is known as trompe-l’oeil, which is French for “fool the eye.” It’s the ultra-realistic kind of painting that was popular in many cultures and centuries, from ancient Pompeii to the Italian Renaissance to the French Baroque. Trompe-l’oeil art has had a bit of a renaissance recently among street artists. You’ve probably received emails with images of sidewalk art that not only fool the eye but also blow the mind. The one in the photo here makes me a little dizzy even though I know it’s an illusion! After my previous post about the huge carpet of flowers in Belgium, today seemed like a good time to post this.
A while ago I had occasion to take out a brief subscription from Shutterstock. I was entitled to upload more photos than I actually needed for my specific projects, so I had fun browsing through the subjects I liked, and uploading some to use on this blog – subjects that I wouldn’t be likely to be able to capture in person. This next picture caught my eye because of the bright colors and the interesting texture. I had no idea what it might be – perhaps a painting on a rough wall? Maybe un-ironed fabric? Whatever it was, I just liked it. Then several days later, I discovered the larger, uncropped version of the same photo, and had my mind blown again! Look what my rough wall turned out to be!
A few clicks over at Google, and I discovered that there is an Elephant Festival in Jaipur, India. I’m betting some of my fellow bloggers out there will be familiar with this. It sounds like a wonderful event to experience!
Top photo from www.majorlycool.com
Bottom photos from Shutterstock
Posts
9 comments:
These works are amazing. I have seen a lot of the works of Julian Beavers and others. All wonderful. These are great.
Fascinating and confusing....hmmm, I'm still trying to catch the construction of your first photo, but its still early in the morning. Perhaps I can view it with a clearer eye later in the day.
I wonder if the tiger in the painted cloth represents the one the Goddess Durga rides? I think that is the proper goddess that I read about in Anil P.'s blog, Windy Skies. Are you familiar with it? He writes beautifully about the customs of his country, and his photos are wonderful
I love street art. I used to spend a lot of time at the South Street Seaport in NYC. they had a space reserved for street artists.
I have to dig out those photos :)
and get a scanner!
I love those trompe-l'oeil paintings! I've seen them on the Internet and thought, 'Oh, how fun!'
I would have never expected that painting to be an elephant. Can't wait to send this to a friend who adores them. Thanks for stopping by my blog. Oh and about the comments, when I used IE as my browser I had the same problem. Firefox is way better at taking comments...not sure if that helps...but I went months unable to leave comments on my favorite blogs!!
Have a good day!!
Sincerely Sherrie
So glad to have helped...I did the exact same thing as you! I still use both. The kids use IE 6 and I use firefox. I like it for the spell check lol! Sometimes it takes a while...but I can't even tell you how frustrated I was not getting to post where I wanted!
Peace Giggles
I just captured painted elephant shots while at Jaipur.
Post a Comment