Visual Jokes in Art History

Psychologists were not the first people to be interested in visual illusions nor the use of illusions or multiple interpretations within a painting.  The January 2011 issue of Smithsonian has a great article called "Feast for the Eyes" along with pictures about the artist Giuseppe Arcimboldo who did such work for the Hapsburg dynasty (in the 1500s) who had humor enough to appreciate his work.  Check out the article at the link above-quite fascinating.

If you like the work of Arcimboldo, check out his complete works on this site.

posted by Chuck Schallhorn

Rob Gonsalves--Artist We All Know, But Don't

If you have been teaching psychology for very long, you've undoubtedly run into the work of Rob Gonsalves, a Canadian painter whose work is quite well known for the illusions that it contains.  Below are some samples.  A large portion of his work can be found at this link on Discover Galleries.

There are dozens more on the website linked above.


posted by Chuck Schallhorn

Figure-Ground Artwork--3-dimensional

Scene360 has another nice set of examples of art that have figure-ground aspects built into them.  Great art.

posted by Chuck Schallhorn

Faces on Walls--from Scene360

This next site has the work of the graffiti artist Alexandre Farto (a.k.a. Vhils) who makes portraits by removing parts of walls and the use of paints.  The 3-D effect seems dramatic in this 2-D representation

posted by Chuck Schallhorn

Hero and Villain on Scene360.com

While searching for something else, I ran across this set of illusions/ambigrams that contain both the heroes and villains in the drawings.  The artist is Simon Page.  The site is scene360.com/

posted by Chuck Schallhorn

Hidden Meanings in Popular Logos

Just discovered a blog site called "Wallet Pop" while looking for some visual illusions in popular culture.  That was when I ran across this beauty: Hidden Meanings in Popular Logos on walletpop.com

This site also explains why the logos are special.  I claim no ownership of this idea, but am happy to share their collection of images that I know your kids will find fascinating.  In the Fed Ex logo, there is an arrow in the ground of the Ex figure. 

In this next image, the Big Ten created an "11" in the ground when they added Penn State. I've looked at that logo all my life and never noticed it.  Hmmmmmmm

I will be posting more illusion sites this week that have flown below our radar.

Posted by Chuck Schallhorn