Comments on: Photo: Escher painting refracted in a drop of falling water

By: Kimmo

Kimmo — Fri, 05 Aug 2011 02:55:00 +0000

This is an absolutely inspired shot.

Escher would approve.

By: C Mast

C Mast — Fri, 05 Aug 2011 02:36:00 +0000

This equivocates to rap music for me.

By: Sebastian Wiers

Sebastian Wiers — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 23:58:00 +0000

Apple Lane – who cares? People who actually care about art, that’s who. Using “painting” as a generic term for 2d art degrades the general level of public appreciation for art, something I would expect Cory Doctrow to care about, seeing as he himself is a producer of art & culture.
Escher put a lot of thought into the process used to create his images, and (like many artists) considered the process as much a work of art (or perhaps craft) as the resulting image, so using the right term for the media matters.

EDIT- the original photographer calling the piece a “sketch” is perhaps acceptable, given that lithographic plates are produced by drawing. Depending on where he’s from, it might even be an accepted term for any drawing, though using more precise terms is generally the better policy when describing well known masterworks of art.

Edit2- @ Daniel Tyson – Printmaking important? Maybe to fancy pants artists, but we here prefer things like the written word, right? Yep, gimme a good book any day- who need printing, amiright?

By: Daniel Tysen

Daniel Tysen — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 22:33:00 +0000

The original is a Lithograph, not a painting. This is important because there’s nearly as many professional printmakers as painters in the art world and no one even knows what printmaking is. Firefox doesn’t even have ‘printmakers’ in its dictionary.

By: Jim B

Jim B — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 18:12:00 +0000

I applaud the effort to create this and purists may scoff, but this could also be created using any desktop 3D software.

By: Apple Lane

Apple Lane — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 17:58:00 +0000

I can’t believe you people are being so darned picky! Who cares if he called it a sketch. We call photographs pix today. Escher is wonderful and this photo of a water droplet is very cool. Why get bogged down in details. Escher would laugh at you “holier than thou” critics.

By: Daniel

Daniel — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 17:54:00 +0000

I think it’s called “Crazy Stairs”…

/FG

By: chrisspurgeon

chrisspurgeon — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 17:47:00 +0000

This is just so totally full of win.

By: gadgetphile

gadgetphile — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 17:34:00 +0000

The maker inside me is thinking that you could use a laser and photodiode right below the eye dropper to trigger a delay circuit that would then trigger the camera when the water drop fell long/far enough.

Yeah, it would take longer to make than the two hours he spent taking this shot, but the fun would be in the making. And you’d be able to swap backdrops (pardon the pun) pretty easily.

edit: okay, maybe it isn’t the maker inside me- more the engineer and perfectionist.

By: Bruce M Campbell

Bruce M Campbell — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 17:11:00 +0000

…but to build on this, print the photo using a 3D printer & polarized nanobot goop programmed to make the characters move up & down (and down & up) the staircases.

That should make multiple instances of the space-time continuum loop around a multidimensional Big Bang/End of the Universe(s).

By: rabidpotatochip

rabidpotatochip — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 16:57:00 +0000

Ha, I found that image as (very well-done) graffiti in a back alley in Vancouver and use a picture of it as my desktop background! The graffiti, not the original. I never realized it was an Escher till now. Thanks for posting that.

By: Sebastian Wiers

Sebastian Wiers — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 16:51:00 +0000

I’m not sure there is even a single “ iconic MC Escher painting” in existance, because M.C. Escher was a master PRINTMAKER. The image in question is a lithograph, which is a print produced from a ‘crayon’ drawing done on stone (or often metal).

But hey, Boing Boing is a really good tv show, despite such minor mistakes.

By: icastico

icastico — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 16:38:00 +0000

Hey, how’d zebbart do that? That wasn’t there when I commented. I swear. Oh well…great minds.

By: seyo

seyo — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 15:42:00 +0000

sorry, did I forget to close the tag again?

By: Zeeky Santos

Zeeky Santos — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 15:15:00 +0000

I hope you’re not serious, because if you are then the only things I can find that might give you that impression are tiny Jpeg artifacts, nothing more.

By: seyo

seyo — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 15:10:00 +0000

definitely a shoop. some of teh pixels, and all that rot.

By: MandoSpaz

MandoSpaz — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 14:50:00 +0000

Is that David Bowie in the back?

By: icastico

icastico — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 14:39:00 +0000

Love it, but would have chosen this Escher instead myself:http://students.philau.edu/wisniewski2600/3escher-hand-with-reflecting-sphere-medium.jpg

By: librtee_dot_com

librtee_dot_com — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 14:34:00 +0000

That’s fucking amazing. Holy shit.

By: Mujokan

Mujokan — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 14:33:00 +0000

The universe is quite high resolution.

By: nixiebunny

nixiebunny — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 14:26:00 +0000

Now print this photo on a Möbius strip suspended by a 2/3 tine fork resting in a Klein bottle, and the space-time continuum will implode.

By: Joe Bauldoff

Joe Bauldoff — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 14:23:00 +0000

If anyone is interested in viewing similar work, photographer Susan Derges had a 1991 collection titled “The Observer and The Observed” that uses the same general technique.

http://www.susanderges.com/
http://www.prixpictet.com/artists/view/252/2367

By: zebbart

zebbart — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 14:22:00 +0000

That’s really awesome. Using this print would be even more appropriate though. http://www.meridian.net.au/Art/Artists/MCEscher/Gallery/Images/escher-hand-with-reflecting-sphere-medium.jpg