The Awe-Inspiring Salt Portraits of Rob Ferrel
A true artist doesn’t really need expensive tools and materials to produce something beautiful, and San Antonio artist Rob Ferrel is the perfect example. For months, he has been treating his Instagram followers with highly realist portraits that he creates using nothing but salt, a few brushes, and a piece of cardstock. Ferrel begins by pouring salt on […]
Chinese Barber Uses Leftover Hair to Create Insanely Realistic Portraits
Li Hailing, a barber from Lingbao, in central China’s Henan province, uses leftovers from his day job to fuel his real passion – art. He collects the hair that he cuts at his salon and, in his spare time, arranges the thousands of strands to create stunningly-realistic celebrity portraits. Li, whose inspiration comes from sand painting, uses […]
The Amazing Ballpoint Pen Portraits of Enam Bosokah
Using only a simple ballpoint pen, Ghana-based artist Enam Bosokah creates stunningly realistic portraits of prominent African personalities. “A lot of guys have already made their name using pencil, so I decided to use a pen,” Bosokah said in an interview with Anadolu Agency. “A lot of artists avoid pens because of the irreversibility (i.e., the inability to erase), […]
Artist’s Painted Portraits Look More Like High-Definition Photographs
Italian artist Marco Grassi paints portraits of women that are so perfect, down to the fine hair lines, pores and freckles on the skin that people often mistake them for photographs. However, Grassi differentiates himself from other hyper-realist painters by giving his artworks a surreal twist. In one painting, for example, his subject’s back is […]
Artist Creates Fluffy Celebrity Portraits with Dog Hair
Colombian-American artist and opera singer Mateo Blanco was in the news late last year for creating three celebrity portraits out of the most unusual material – dog hair! Blanco revealed that he was listening to Lennon when inspiration struck, and he decided to honor the three late singers with dog hair purchased from a local groomer. […]
Every White Line in these Ultra-Realistic Animal Portraits is Just a Scratch
We’ve seen highly talented artists burn paper, roller skate, and even kick a football around to create art. But here’s something new – Illinois artist Allan Ace Adams actually scratches away at paper to create breathtaking animal portraits. It’s called scratchboard art, and it involves using an exacto knife to scrape away a top layer […]
Artist Creates Awe-Inspiring Portrait with 20,000 Teabags
Shanghai-based artist ‘Red’ Hong Yi has made a name for herself in the art world by creating larger-than-life portraits of celebrities using unconventional materials. For her latest masterpiece Red used 20,000 teabags to depict a tea maker practicing his trade. To create the incredibly complex portrait, Hong Yi stained the tea bags individually by steeping them […]
The Shockingly Realistic Sculptures of Kazuhiro Tsuji
We’ve featured a lot of hyper-realistic paintings on OC in the past, but here’s something we haven’t seen very often – unbelievably realistic human busts. These 3D sculptures are so life-like that they could give Madam Tussauds a run for their money. They’re the work of Japanese artist Kazuhiro Tsuji, who employs a variety of mold […]
Artist Turns Discarded Paintbrushes into Elegant Female Figures
San Francisco-based artist Rebecca Szetto uses paintbrushes to create her amazing artworks, but not in the way you would expect. Since 1999, she has been carving the handles of old discarded paintbrushes and turning the essential painting tools into actual works of art. Rebecca’s unique project began almost 16 years ago, while working as faux […]
Awesome Pixelated Portraits Made with Thousands of Expertly Arranged Paint Swatches
Peter Combe is a San Francisco-based visual artist who specializes in creating three-dimensional artwork using nothing but paint swatches, hand-punched into small disks. Using his special technique, Combe creates stunning pieces that range from abstract pattern-based compositions to highly realistic pixelated portraits with a vintage photograph-like quality. Combe has a huge collection of paint swatch […]
Multimedia Artist Creates Portrait of Nikola Tesla Using Electricity
To pay tribute to Serbian inventor and electrical engineering genius Nikola Tesla, artist Phil Hansen recently created a portrait of him using only electric sparks. A time lapse video of Hansen creating the painting shows him connecting a couple of wires to a large battery. He then brings the two naked ends of the wire […]
Alzheimer-Suffering Artist Drew His Self-Portrait for Five Years until He Forgot How to Draw
When American artist William Utermohlen was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in 1995, he decided to make the best use of his limited time and memory. He began to use his art to understand himself better – for five years, he drew portraits of himself before he completely forgot how to draw. Through this unique series of […]
The Photo-Like Paintings of Hyung Jin Park
Korean artist Hyung Jin Park uses photographs as inspiration to create equally realistic paintings of young Asian women. He generally paints bust-length portraits of a monumental scale, up to seven feet high, depicting women at close range. The hair, lips, eyes and skin are painted with a high level of precision, making them unbelievably real. […]
Artist Creates Celebrity Portraits with Thousands of Suspended Buttons
Artist Augusto Esquivel is an expert at transforming mundane objects into spectacular works of art. One of his specialties is working with standard sewing buttons, which he uses to create stunning, larger-than-life celebrity portraits. Augusto’s technique is as tedious as you’d imagine – it’s not an easy arranging thousands of buttons to form an easily […]
Hong Yi Strikes Again with Football Painted Portraits of Popular World Cup Players
Shanghai-based artist Hong Yi, a.k.a. ‘Red’, has combined her love for football and art in a very unique way – she recently painted a massive portrait of three superstars of the 2014 FIFA World Cup – Ronaldo, Neymar and Messi – by dribbling a paint-covered football on a canvas. Red didn’t use a single paintbrush […]