Julie's Notes on These Quilts
The Dutch artist M. C. Escher is known for his lithographs and woodcuts showing...well...things that look right, but really can't exist. They play games with perspective and perplex even the most devoted rationalist. They just don't seem possible, yet there they are.
We find that many people can't "see" these, or need to stare at them quite a while before a slow, "Oh, yeaahhh....." emerges.
This page includes several figures with strained geometry, as well as genuinely impossible ones.
1. Impossible Block: At first, this block seems OK, but...uh-oh...look at the corners!
2. Aquarium: An impossible window frames an aquarium, while an impossible fish swims by.
3. Impossilbe Towers: Based on a picture in a child's book on impossible designs.
4. Wooden Puzzle: I love the way that the wooden blocks let me experiment with colors, textures, and shading.
5. Star Spiral: A complex geometrical spiral made out of simple star blocks.
6. Blocks and Spiral: More blocks, and a spiral as well.
7. Baby's Blocks: A traditional idea, but it can fool the eye. Are the small blocks inside or outside of the large one?
8. Tribar 1: An impossible tribar floats lazily among the planets.
9. Inside, Outside, Upside-Down: I put this together after taking a workshop from Karen Combs. Finished October 2000.