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Astonishing creations by masters of the art, such as Escher, Dali, and Archimbolo; amazing visual trickery; and an illuminating foreword by the Pulitzer Prize--winning author Douglas R. Hofstadter make this 320-page, breathtaking collection the definitive book of optical illusions. Rings of seahorses that seem to rotate on the page. Butterflies that transform right before your eyes into two warriors with their horses. A mosaic portrait of oceanographer Jacques Cousteau made from seashells. These dazzling and often playful artistic creations manipulate perspective so cleverly that they simply outwit our brains: we can't just take a quick glance and turn away. They compel us to look once, twice, and over and over again, as we try to figure out exactly how the delightful trickery manages to fool our perceptions so completely. Of course, first and foremost, every piece is beautiful on the surface, but each one offers us so much more. Some, including Sandro del Prete's charming "Window Gazing," construct illusionary worlds where normal conceptions of up, down, forward, and back simply have no meaning anymore. Others, such as Jos De Mey's sly "Ceci n'est pas un Magritte," create visual puns on earlier work. From Escher's famous and elaborate "Waterfall" to Shigeo Fukuda's "Mary Poppins," where a heap of bottles, glasses, shakers, and openers somehow turn into the image of a Belle Epoque woman when the spotlight hits them, these works of genius will provide endless enjoyment and food for thought. Rings of seahorses seem to rotate and butterflies seems to transform into warriors right on the page. Astonishing creations of visual trickery by masters of the art, such as Escher, Dali, and Archimbolo make this breathtaking collection the definitive book of optical illusions

The seventy original optical and geometrical allover patterns in this book have been created by Jean Larcher, one of today's leading French graphic artists. He uses circles, squares, curves, lines, and angles in a myriad of ways, creating some of the most fascinating, innovative patterns ever. The dynamic quality of each design is vibrantly clear. Grouped thematically are dazzling circles, popping squares, shimmering angles, emerging dots, receding diamonds, undulating waves. The visual illusions and movement produced are phenomenal, as some patterns recede, others advance, and still others appear to change size. Some are simple; some are startling and complex--but all are intriguing. Because these patterns repeat infinitely in all directions, they may be readily extended for graphics and design work on any scale. The designs may be reproduced just as they are, or cropped, enlarged, repeated, screened, overlaid, or reworked in any manner.

Among the most baffling and entertaining illusions are those created by anamorphic distortion. By sophisticated application of the laws of perspective, pictures can be stretched and distorted beyond recognition, remaining 'unreadable' until they are viewed from a special angle or with the aid of a suitably shaped reflecting surface. In this book we can play the game of perspective distortion in the company of artists such as Leonardo, Holbein, Caravaggio, and Carracci, and follow its progress through the centuries ... A sheet of reflecting silver plastic is packed in each book. When rolled into a cylinder and placed on a circular picture, it unravels the many secrets -- the hidden political, religious, and erotic images -- that lie hidden in these strange and wonderful works of art