A Funny Thing Happened at the Faire.
Remember the Marilyn Monroe morph in my July 4th post? Remember when I said that on average about 1 person out of every 7 people can instantly identify Marilyn Monroe without using a mirror decoder? I was wrong. Turns out it depends on the folks who show up! When you...
Morph-O-Scopes Circus Kit Review – September 2017
by Melissa Williamson, The Old Schoolhouse Magazine® "My girls get excited about anything art and science related. When the Morph-O-Scopes Circus Kit arrived on our doorstep, the girls couldn’t wait to get their hands on it! This fabulous kit entertained my little...
Super Human Skills – Does Your Child Have a Hidden One?
Rare and Valuable Talents Might be Discovered in that Young Head! I remember witnessing a jaw-dropping ability in an eleven year-old. The child had no clue he possessed the gift. That day changed his life and mine. The occasion was a reflection/refraction workshop I...
Hidden in Plain Sight! Like Anamorphic Art!
More than 500 years ago clever Chinese artists invented mirror anamorphic optical illusions to conceal politically dangerous or socially offensive images in plain sight. (OOZ & OZ uses that concept today to entertain and educate our tech-savvy kids!) Today, too,...
The Writing’s on the Wall – Definitely Off the Wall!
OK Go's Anamorphic Art Video is their latest optical illusion treat. Rolling Stone says the video took nearly three weeks to rehearse and 50 takes to get right. https://youtu.be/m86ae_e_ptU
This Sandman Will Hypnotize You! No Sleeping Possible!
Credit: Core 77 6/1/15 Using a Steel Ball, Motorized Magnets and Sand to Draw CNC Zen Gardens. Combing your Zen garden with a rake is so 15th Century. So inventor Bruce Shapiro's Sisyphus machine ditches the rake and uses steel balls, untouched by human hands and...
“Man and Woman” – A Truly Moving Love Story
“Man and Woman” is a 26 foot tall animated steel sculpture by Georgian sculptor Tamara Kvesitadze. It is installed in the seaside city of Batumi, Georgia. The two figures represent a Muslim boy, Ali, and a Georgian princess, Nino, from a famous 1937 novel by...
“Coloring meets funhouse mirror magic” – A Review
The following review of Morph-O-Scopes Kits appeared in the September 2010 CoolMomPicks. We learned of it only recently! The review is reprinted here with permission of Liz Gumbinner, Publisher, Editor-in-Chief of CoolMomPicks.com. "I'm not going to lie to you: When...
Balloon Animals to Blow Your Mind!
Yeah, yeah, we've all seen some party entertainer fashion a 4-balloon dachshund or poodle, but have you seen someone create a balloon iguana, or crab, or seahorse or grasshopper? Not like these, I bet! Japanese artist Masayoshi Matsumoto has raised this craft to an...
Hole-Punched Flipbooks – A Clever New Approach
Acknowledgement: COLOSSAL Art, Design, and Visual Culture by Christopher Jobson on April 13, 2015 Artist Scott Blake, known widely for his barcode art, recently began experimenting with the humble hole puncher. By punching different patterns that shift from page to...
Optical Illusion Breakthroughs – USA, Singapore, Belgium
Salmon sculpture, Portland, Oregon People Of The River by Chong Fah Cheong, Singapore De Vaartkapoen, Brussels, Belgium
Optical Illusions: Hololens, Pepper’s Ghost, First Valentine
It's been quite the week for optical illusions in our family! First of all, two days ago Microsoft launched its ultra top secret product - Hololens. My daughter, a software engineer at MS, said she has been working on this project for more than two years! OMG, people,...
Gifts from Brusspup, Our Favorite Optical Illusion Guy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=UW5bcsax78I It's an old visual trick: precisely parallel lines on a transparent sheet slid over specially striated images create the illusion of motion. But Brusspup always delivers fresh fun. In this new...
DIY Christmas Trees
Culled from one of my favorite blogs - Design Swan - posted 11 Dec 2014 "Christmas is not only a wonderful time to celebrate love and joy with your family and friends, but also a great time to let your creativity flourish. There are plenty of brilliant Christmas tree...
Ive got it!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=TJ1SDXbij8Y Oh, I wish I were able to afford everything Jony Ive serves up for Apple, but at least I get to drool over products and concepts he and Apple newbie Marc Newson will be concocting for our...
Vanishing Church …Now You See it…Now You Don’t!
“Reading between the Lines” is an installation created by architectural duo Pieterjan Gijs and Arnout Van Vaerenberghare. Located in Limburg, Belgium, the structure resembles a rustic old church covered with clapboard or ship lap siding. When seen from the right high...
Anamorphic Art – Honda Rides the Trend!
Auto maker gets on board with brain-tickling optical illusion fun! Keep your eyes on the shadows. https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=UelJZG_bF98
Animals Turned Upside-Down Morph into Different Species
No. This isn't a variation of cow tipping. It's the clever optical illusion art of Jérôme Gonfond.
There are People Hidden in Your Basement!
And Animals in Your Kitchen Cabinets! Find them! Get them out of there. Get your kids to help! And you'll discover a fun, cheap, visual training activity this summer. Inspiration is everywhere! French artist Gilbert Legrand turned everyday household objects like a...
5 Reasons NOT to Buy Morph-O-Scopes Kits, Packets & Party Fun Packs
1. You might get a concussion (smacking yourself in the forehead and moaning, “Why didn’t I buy these sooner?!”) 2. Your heart could race (“Why are the kids being so quiet in the other room?”) 3. You’ll think you’re hallucinating (What?! Do I really see them sharing a...
OK GO Anamorphic Art. That’s What I’m Talking About!
Great anamorphic art antics and optical illusion fun video: OK GO's "The Writing's On the Wall"! http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=m86ae_e_ptU
Negative and Positive: Optical Illusions and Anamorphosis
I adore negatives that are also positives - anything that can be seen more than one way. I grin like a fool at two-toned silk fabric, figure/ground logos, mowed baseball fields, vacuumed-patterned rugs, and even double entendres like Flintstones' slogan "10 Million...
Bacteria Art – This Could Go Viral!
OK. OK. I hear the groans. (Giggle) My brain can't resist playing with words the way Zachery Copfer plays with bacteria - fancifully, lovingly. Microbiologist-turned-artist, Copfer has had a long, close, I might even say symbiotic interaction with bacteria. He got...
Hidden in Plain Sight – Rain-Activated Art
WEST SEATTLE — (Brett Cihon's article paraphrased below.) Peregrine Church, 21, has created art with a different twist. The art appears only when it rains. Church uses a biologically friendly superhydrocoating to paint inspirational phrases on sidewalks. The image is...
2014 Academics’ Choice BRAIN TOY Award Winner!
Morph-O-Scopes “Sports of All Sorts” Kit Wins 2014 Academics’ Choice Award for Mind-Building Excellence SEATTLE, WA (May 1, 2014) – OOZ & OZ is pleased to announce that its Morph-O-Scopes “Sports of All Sorts” Kit has been honored with a 2014 Academics’ Choice...
Academics’ Choice Awards
Academics' Choice Awards™ help parents and educators validate claims such as "better thinking” and “educational toy” with a qualified, scientific and objective approach to evaluation. Academics' Choice Awards™ bring recognition to the best thinking-based products in...
Q: Is STEAM Just a Lot of Hot Air?
What do I think? I think the Arts absolutely deserve a seat at the STEM table. No question! The Arts utilize the same critical thinking skills essential for Science, Technology, Engineering and Math. The difference between STEM and STEAM lies chiefly in the form taken...
Optical Illusions for Ray-Ban by Brusspup – Awesome!
The first video below - Brusspup's Rubik's Cube - went viral this year. I know because customers from all over the world who loved and bought Morph-O-Scopes from me at the Ventures Store in Seattle's Pike Place Market were excited to share the video as "this other...
Forgive me, followers, for I have sinned (according to the bible of blog). It has been four months since my last post.
I really shouldn't feel guilty. After all, I was having some big life events: a "totaled" car, near loss of my nonagenarian mom, and my own double hernia surgery (followed by nasty post-op UTIs and two re-injured cervical disks. (Thank you, anesthesiologist!) Good...
Secret Messages
The Ventures store at Seattle's Pike Place Market often invites me to come demonstrate my eye-boggling optical illusion art & science kits. For customers to see Morph-O-Scopes secret images, their correct viewing angle is essential. Since kids and parents are...
Optical Illusion Dance
It's universal, our delight with things optical illusion. On 8 марта (March 8), International Women's Day in Russia, these ladies performed a clever little optical illusion number to the delight of the entire audience. Click the photo to see the video. As you can see,...
I Wish I Had the Time These Guys Have!
http://vimeo.com/60491636 I'd just sit and watch the clock all day! I'm even fantasizing about flying to Dubai to do it. That's where Stockholm-based designers Bastian Bischoff and Per Emanuelsson are exhibiting this utterly brilliant timepiece during Design Days...
Love in the Shadows
For this woman (and I'm not alone) receiving chocolates and a dozen long stemmed red roses on Valentine's Day is a total yawn. So conventional. No effort involved. But some lucky gal's guy (or guy's gal or guy's guy or gal's gal) put real thought into speaking from...
Love is an Optical Illusion
Ambivalent feelings this Valentine's Day? Read the black letters then read the pink to see the opposite. Ambigrams are extremely clever exercises in graphic design that play with optical illusions, symmetry and visual perception to create images which can be read more...
Early Holiday Gifts from Brusspup
One of my favorite optical illusionists, Brusspup, is at it again with his latest anamorphic tricks. I understand he shoots photos of simple oblects like those in the photo below, skews the images in Photoshop, prints them, trims the paper, and positions the skewed...
Eye Don’t Think So….
Is it a mermaid surfacing out of sea foam? A frog peeking through bubble spawn? Barbie having a shampoo? None of the above. It's an optical illusion of an eye-shaped whirlpool, inadvertently captured by Reddit user Liammm. "Out of boredom" in cooking class he had...
And for After All that Sugar – Halloween Skull Art #31
This clever, healthy snack of apple slices, mini marshmallows, and peanut butter... Courtesy of Toms River Dental Care
What to Put into Your Halloween Skull – #30
Finally, 4 More Skulls by Orosz – Halloween Skull Art #29
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
And Yet Another Skull by Orosz – Halloween Skull Art #28
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
And Another by Orosz – Halloween Skull Art #27
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
One More by Orosz – Halloween Skull Art #26
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Orosz – Halloween Skull Art #25
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Russian Imperial Family – Halloween Skull Art #24
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Four Bodies – Halloween Skull Art #23
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Watermelon – Halloween Skull Art #22
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Three Still Dripping with Blood – Halloween Skull Art #21
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Apple Core – Halloween Skull Art #20
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Draped Women – Halloween Skull Art #19
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Red Cabbage – Halloween Skull Art #18
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Tete a Tete in Shadows – Halloween Skull Art #17
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Halloween Skull Art #16 – Eggplant
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Halloween Skull Art #15 – Mosaic by Charis Tsevis
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Halloween Skull Art #14 – Silhouettes
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Halloween Skull Art #13 – Car
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Halloween Skull Art #12 – Woman at Bakery
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Halloween Skull Art #11 – Boudoir
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Halloween Skull Art #10 – Two Women
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Halloween Skull Art #9 – Green Cabbage
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Halloween Skull Art #8 – Ash
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Halloween Skull Art #7 – Children Playing
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Halloween Skull Art #6 – View from the Crypt
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Halloween Skull Art #5 – Bike Helmet?
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Halloween Skull Art #4 – Bloody Nose
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Halloween Skull Art #3 – “All is Vanity”
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Halloween Skull Art #2 – Graduation
Please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings I collected over the past year. By Halloween you’ll be up to your own eye sockets in skulls!
Halloween Skull Art #1 – Rotting Cantaloupes
While I heal from my eye surgeries, please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and drawings collected over the past year. By Halloween you'll be up to your skull in skulls! Sorry about not being able to research...
Watch Out! Halloween is Coming!
A friend sent this clever graphic to me, minus the artist's name, alas. 31 Days of Halloween Art Skulls starting tomorrow! While I heal from my eye surgeries, please visit my blog every day in October to enjoy images of some rather ingenious skull carvings and...
31 Days of Halloween Art Skulls
Endlessly thrilling! Endlessly terrifying! Endlessly inspiring! Over this past year I came across some very ingenious, very creative skull images from around the world. Visit my blog every day throughout October to enjoy the entire collection. By Halloween you'll be...
STEM Education Needs Good Visual Art Curriculum Partners
Scientific Method depends on top-notch observation skills that visual art curricula should be enhancing, but some art lessons need serious improvement. Let's take the portrait-drawing formula - where kids draw an oval head, grid it, position eyes, eyebrows, nose,...
Bainbridge Boys & Girls Club Was Feelin’ the Oohs & Ahhs!
... and gettin' the giggles, gasping "whoa!" and calling Morph-O-Scopes activities "Awesome!" Kids 5 to 12 were all totally engaged and delighted, as you'll see. And so was the staff! What a terrific afternoon for everyone! My videographer at the event was the...
Elevator Doors That’ll Give You a Lift!
My new Indiegogo campaign launch has me pondering portals. I found this clever collection of elevator doors optical illusions at VisualFunHouse.com. Click images to enlarge. Some elevator doors open to reveal a delightful surprise on the back wall of the elevator,...
It’s official! We’ve launched Our Indiegogo campaign!
"Let's Gang Up and Keep Making Fun of Optical Physics!" Dear Friends and Fans, A couple decades ago, a just-divorced, financially strapped mom had a dream. It didn’t start as her dream. It started as a simple idea to create affordable optical illusion coloring fun for...
Happy Father’s Day Rebus – Back by Popular Demand!
Rebus Redux! Here it is again! Thanks for loving this rebus I created for my 3rd and 4th Grade lunchroom crowd. Please just promise me that your little rebus-loving artists will draw everything themselves on their own Father's Day cards. Got any others you'd love to...
All Mediums are Huge – #2 – Anamorphic Apple Slices
The most exciting interactive art today in public and private spaces - hands down - is anamorphic art - in all its variations! Google alerts show it's spreading across the globe like wildfire! Anamorphic art inspires with its ingenuity. The great thing about it in a...
San Francisco’s Got Tunnel Vision! But Utah Started It!
Displayed in a BART station under San Francisco is a 3-D total-immersion optical illusion tunnel wrap of Utah's Delicate Arch. Watch as commuters experience the astonishing merging of a glorious Utah desert panorama: Delicate Arch...
All Mediums are Huge These Days! #1 – Cast Shadows
So what if you can't afford standard art supplies! All mediums are huge these days! Draw with cast shadows! Check out these ingenious art works. Every example makes me pump my fist, "Yeah! That's what I'm talking about!" Use what you've got and don't cry over...
Greenpeace’s 3D Street Art Warns About Toxic Chemicals in Our Laundry
This article, written by Amanda Coen, 03/22/12, as seen in ecouterre.com, is reproduced below in its entirety. Yes, your eyes do deceive you. Greenpeace activists conspired with Planet Streetpainting artists to create a mind-bending optical illusion at the World...
Floating Cube & Hollow Heads – Outside-In Optical Illusions
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=E9I-Onwfqpo http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=VKq4DZpPPFs http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=bC9-cFqqp3k I love these clever visual illusion mind-blowers! I...
Edgy Arts! Lenticular Graffiti and Fore-Edge Painting
When I was a kid we called these delightful little Cracker Jack prizes flip-flop toys or wiggle pictures. A one-inch plastic square embossed with two different images. Tilt the square up then down and a secret message is revealed! Enchanting stuff to an eight year...
I Heart Mabona Origami Dreaming of Your Love
http://vimeo.com/2190319
Brace Yourself! These Optical Illusions Will Floor You!
The latest sensation in interior design is trippy floor covering! Every floor you’re seeing is 100% code flat! From the seismic shift carpet on the left, spotted in a Paris video game store, to the gentle waves in the new ballroom of the Marriott Solana in Southlake,...
Year of the Dragon – Happy New Optical Illusion Fuyuu!
Remember those Magic Eye pics in the ‘90s where you had to overpower your instinct to focus in order to see an image hidden in an overall pattern? Well, phew! “Fuyuu” Op Art is totally different. Here you simply focus on the center spot in the image. Move your head...
Accidental Crocheted Playground – A Delightful Yarn!
Toshiko Horiuchi Macadam, one of Japan's leading fiber artists, was exhibiting her crocheted Multiple Hammock #1 when two children entered the gallery and, blissfully unaware of the rules that govern the display of fine art, asked to sit in it. The artist watched...
“Magic Carp-pet” Moire Optical Illusion
Moiré effect optical illusion A moiré effect optical illusion results from two static transparent patterns sliding across each other - like layers of shear nylon fabric. As the overlapped layers move independently, new patterns form. The GIF on the left shows how...
Anamorphic Season’s Greetings to All!
2011 Best Toys Guide, 2011 Top Toys List …….. Sez Who?!
You're busy. Money's tight. You want the best toy for your buck. Being smart, you turn to sources who've done the hunting for you. Sometimes that's friends, mommy bloggers or Best Toy Guides and Top Toy Lists. But here's a news flash. Some of those "Best Toys" and...
Thinking Outside the Rubik’s Cube – Art Phenom Pixel Pete
“Dream Big” was a year-long project in which "Pixel Pete" Fecteau created a brilliant mosaic of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. using 4,242 manipulated Rubik’s Cubes! Fecteau created the installation for ArtPrize2010 - Grand Rapids, Michigan's fabulous annual art...
Pumpkin Carving Par Excellence
Remember that "Pukin' Pumpkin" a few years ago. The art has stepped up. A lot! Check out these ingenious works of pumpkin art by Ray Villafane, an American model designer and former art teacher - carved with just a spoon and a scalpel!
Do Nothing for the Next 10 Minutes but Watch this Clock!
Mind-Blowing 3-D Video Mapping http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=QjWJHEmFfPA The following is quoted from an article by Chris Jablonski, Emerging Tech reporter for zdnet.com. “For decades, artists like Krzysztof Wodiczko have created...
I Spy Halloween Decorations and Inspirations
Need to decorate for Halloween on a shoestring? Check out these optical illusion assemblages by artist James Hopkins. His series of compositions named "Vanitas" are comprised of household objects arranged on plain bookshelves to form images of skulls. What a clever...
Optical Illusion Fashion – Shadow Knitting
In my last post I promised more optical illusion fashions. Shadow knitting is a clever optical illusion technique that produces patterns which vary with the direction of viewing. “The visual effect of shadow knitting is due to the different height of the knit...
Optical Illusion – Hot Fashion Trend!
Optical illusion clothes are sizzling! The optical illusion dress worn by Kate Winslet (left) at the 68th Venice Film Festival last month has been creating lots of steamy press. It's the Stella McCartney Bicolour Octavia, and it's clever white "uplift" panel and...
Summer was a Blur of Activity!
Three days ago, the new, easier-to-navigate OOZandOZ.com website went live! And two Saturdays ago, my daughter got married. As the only person with a station wagon, I was the default go-fer for cases of wine, ladders, seating, etc. What fun! What exciting beginnings!...
The World Was Supposed to End Last Week.
On schedule, July 16, 2011. A grassy 3-D slant anamorphosis optical illusion globe entitled "Qui Croire?" ("Who to Believe?"), designed by French artist François Abélanet to focus attention on environmental issues, was to have been removed from in front of Paris City...
Optical Illusion Wordplay: Ambigrams
Ambigrams. Rotate the art 180° and it still reads the same! Remember the Angels & Demons logo for Dan Brown's book and film? John Langdon created it. John and I met 15 years ago when we were both exhibiting at a big trade show in New York City. We were impressed...
Shopping Bags That’ll Grab YOU!
Simply had to share these terribly clever shopping bags. See more created by BoredPanda.com.
Deception. It’s All in Your Point of View!
Joseph Egan and Hunter Thompson are first year Graphic Design Communication Students currently studying at Chelsea College of Art & Design in London. Exploring the relationship between graphic design and architecture, they learned about master artist Felice...
…there are tops, and then there are TOPS !
Spinning tops are one of the oldest recognizable toys found on archaeological sites. They originated independently in cultures all over the world - doubtless due to a basic human fascination with things that spin and teeter and balance. (Good old physics!) Japanese...
Digital Choreography
Ingenious performance art from the old Tonight Show. I missed it the first time around not being a regular viewer. Thanks to Bernie DeKoven (Major Fun) we get to enjoy this delightfully timeless bit. [youtube...
This is an SOS
"SOS: Save our Supplies" is a video for DOC2DOCK, "a non-profit organization that saves usable medical supplies from being discarded in the U.S. and sends them to hospitals in the developing world." The silk screened words on Kraft-faced corrugated boxes is...
Forget Justin Bieber. Just Get Rebuses!
Have to entertain a group of middle school kids? Believe it or not, rebuses can wow ‘em! I was a new art teacher at an affluent private school in Virginia. Three of us were assigned lunch duty to keep order in the cafeteria and police the area. Well, I remembered how...
How Cracker Jack Changed My Life
August 1950. A magical month for 8 year-olds at the Jersey Shore. We got 25₵ each day to spend anyway we wished, on comic books (10₵) or candy or games at the arcade! Our best fun adventure, though, was crawling under the boardwalk to find fallen treasure - coins or...
Anamorphosis Smarty Pants!
Gutsy enough to send corrections to a dictionary or encyclopedia? What do you think of people who do? Are they just “smarty pants”? Well, meet Smarty Pants Me! Decades ago I sent a note to Webster’s New World Dictionary about their strangely illustrated abacus. As...
Decorated Eggs Redux
The dictionary defines “redux” as "restored” or "brought back". Here are two little stories about Easter eggs redux. Easter Egg Restored “It” happened the last time my daughter and I decorated eggs. “It” was completely my fault. I accidentally crushed one of our...
The Beatles, Marilyn Monroe, Jimi Hendrix and Mozart reconstructed
Graphic artist Erika Iris Simmons works in wonderfully unconventional media. She likes to take things- random things - like you would find at a garage sale or in a thrift store - and make them into composite art. "Most of my pieces become portraits of people...
Ooooh, Take Me Out to the Ball Game Fence
Optical illusion lovers, there’s a delightful surprise behind Seattle’s Safeco Field ballpark. If you're beside the chain link fence, it looks like someone randomly shoved ping pong balls into spaces. But seen from a distance, the fence merges into an ingenious black...
PETA will approve this Optical Illusion!
Can you figure out how it's done? I think I can. Let's compare theories. www.OOZandOZ.com Optical Illusion Toys and Activities
How Optical Illusions Saved a Maryland Community
In Frederick, Maryland, there is a bridge painted with trompe l'oeil murals and slant art. I visited the bridge to see its optical illusions. I came away with the story of its creation - a profoundly moving tale of community achievement. In early 1993, artist...
Wait! Watch Your Step!
This mind blowing PhotoShopped image was sent to me by a friend who shares my passion for optical illusion art. I Googled the photo credit and was blown away (fortunately, not like the guy below) by Worth 1000's creative photo contest entries. Check 'em out!...
Flowers and Hearts for Valentine’s Day
“Yuan yang" is a typical Hong Kong beverage mix of tea and coffee, and also a symbol of marriage and love. Sculptor Tsang Cheung-shing united both concepts in an ingenious ceramic work in which tea and coffee poured from separate cups flow together in a passionate...
Lights and Shadows: Illusions of Love
Sunday evening, I joined my dearest friends for a sense-sational candle-lit birthday dinner at Salty's overlooking Elliott Bay. Seattle skyline party lights rippled across gentle waves. Reflections of our candle flames and balloons danced in the dark picture windows....
Toy Inventor’s Blog Serves First Course: Stove-top Illusions
As Chief Morphology Officer at OOZ & OZ, I have decided to create this blog to share with you my passion for mirror art and toys and other optical illusions. Optical illusions, inventive images, mind-challenging toys thrill and fascinate me. They tickle my gray...