Optical Illusions in Art

Various types of optical illusions that I came across..

Oblique Anamorphus illusions –  Anamorphosis is the distortion of an image by projecting it at an angle, so that when it is viewed normally, the image looks abnormal, but only when viewed form a certain angle and distance looks like a normal image. One of the famous artists who is excellent at creating anamorphus illusions is the pavement chalk artist Julian Beever.

This sort of illusion has always interested me, and we see it very cleverly used commercially during cricket matches, where the advertisements or sponsor names are painted on the field obliquely such that the main camera that has a view of the pitch can view the image correctly without distortion.

Here’s one of Dali on the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art

Another example of anamoprhism

My favourite type of illusion is illusion created with colour – the neo-Impressionist style called Pointillism, where every colour is broken down to more basic elements and painted as dots. The whole image is painted in dots of colours, and only when viewed from a distance, the whole image begins to take shape. Georges Seurat is said to have founded this movement and it was all about juxtaposition of coloured dots such that it created the impression of a whole object.