Art & Design

WIRED sat down with forensic scientist Thiago Piwowarczyk and art historian Jeffrey Taylor PhD to get the inside skinny on ways that science and a skilled eye can help detect art forgeries. Abstract works like Jackson Pollock’s drips and splashes are especially challenging.

Jordan Coelho and Josselin Bey assembled a team of 14 Montréal artists to contribute to this collaborative animation, in which each person was asked to imagine a pinball machine using their aesthetic. The result is visual and auditory magic. Also, we really want a PaRappa the Rapper machine now.

Giangrande’s inspiring folk track Free to Roam is complemented beautifully by Gianluca Maruotti’s stop-motion music video. The claymation imagery was created using with the scenes playing out against a flattened backdrop. Be sure to watch the behind the scenes video too.

We had to go back in time to 2010 to find the original video of this crazy device, but the payoff was worth it. Forssa1’s crazy spinning contraption is loaded up with RGB LEDs and looks like some sort of inter-dimensional travel portal when activated. More here.

Etsy seller PurpleWires takes ordinary coffee tables and makes them extraordinary coffee tables. Choose from tables which light up with rainbow colored animations, or even let you play Tetris or Snake. Our only concern is shipping the furniture all the way from Ukraine.

Pop Chart’s The World of Ice and Fire print crams in people, animals, items and landmarks from Game of Thrones. The nicely illustrated poster features sigils, weapons and armor, castles and even food. It will be released after the series ends to ensure that it’s up to date.

We’ve seen industrial machines that can bend wires into shapes, but thanks to 3D printing and low-cost controllers like Arduino, you can make your own desktop machine now. How to Mechatronics shows us exactly how. Grab the full instructions, models, code, and schematics here.

LEGO is testing a set of special bricks with studs that form Braille symbols. The kit will consist of 250 pieces, which consist of the alphabet, numbers, math symbols and more. LEGO will make it available to select institutions for free by 2020.

Animator and illustrator Josh Shaffner’s freaking amazing short film is a dark, yet vivid look at the world of a struggling waiter in Los Angeles, and the cold, harsh realities of trying to make it in the big city. Did we say “freaking amazing?”

Lover of all things with magnets, Magnetic Games used a hundreds of magnetized girders and spheres to construct an impressive desktop replica of the Eiffel Tower. The video is both visually hypnotic and serves as a great bit of ASMR as well.

We love the celestial background and colorful faceted backs on these cards by illustrator Iryna Semenova. The gemstone suits feature sapphire spades, ruby hearts, emerald clubs, and diamond diamonds. Now we want some Lucky Charms. Pre-order now for shipping starting 7/1/19.

Etsy store CreativeHolz made two unique coat racks out of chessboards and chess pieces. The wall-mounted racks come in two variants. One demonstrates the Caro-Kann Defense opening while the other has the pieces arranged in the Italian Game.

Daihei Shibata’s short film is brilliant in its simplicity. It features two images – a line graph and an actual object. The graph then updates to reflect the state of the real world item. The accompaniment by Fukushima Yasuharu and the EX NOVO Chamber Choir is the icing on the cake.

Japanese artist Takumitoxin drew Thanos and the main heroes of Avengers: Endgame in the style of ukiyo-e or traditional Japanese woodblock printing. He cast Thor as a Buddhist deity, the Hulk as a sumo wrestler, and Ronin as, well, a ninja.

Ben Uyeda of Homemade Modern shows us how to build a modern, geometric chair using nothing more than plywood, a drill, and zipties. Check out the full build guide and templates here. He recommends using 1/2″ ply instead of 1/4″ ply for maximum durability.

Odin Makes built a replica of Thanos’ sick double-bladed sword from Avengers: Endgame out of his usual craft and found materials. He used PVC pipes, an old fiberglass rod and of course craft foam to make a lightweight 7ft sword.

Here in the US, cotton candy is typically just a big fluffy pillow of spun sugar, but in China, it’s often turned into amazing works of edible art by street vendors. Watch as this candy chef in Chongqing, China turns sugar into an intricate multi-color flower. Oh the humanity at 8:11!

These unique light bulbs feature a simulated spiral filament wired up with long-lasting LEDs, and can be had in a variety of vibrant colors. Sadly, they only work with E27 sockets and a 220-volt power source, though you can find a similar 110v bulb on Amazon.

Created by Chicago’s Mechanical Design Labs, the RODA is a beautiful and hypnotic desktop object. Spin the brass wheel up to speed with its ripcord, and set it on the aluminum stand, or hold it in your hands and balance it on your fingertip. Bearings allow it to be spun on its vertical axis too.

Origin Artwork offers this highly-detailed laser-etched 3D wood model of the Death Star’s famous trench from Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope. It’s ready to be wall-mounted and comes in three sizes – 8″x 16″, 10″x 20″ and 20″x 40″.

Inspired by early filmmakers like Eadweard Muybridge, James Medcraft created his hypnotic short film by slicing imagery captured from a moving vehicle in Hong Kong. Like reassembling slivers of shredded paper, he creates a work of art from what would otherwise be mundane imagery.

LEGO Technic expert Yoshihito ISOGAWA created a couple of neat little drawing machines, which spin around while holding an Apple Pencil, resulting in Spirograph-style drawings on an iPad screen. He also made a rig that does pointilist drawings.

Vanishing Inc.’s morbid cards are inspired by the wild west and the demise of Wild Bill Hickok, who was gunned down during a poker game. Each of its cards has a bullet hole straight through its middle, and the infamous “Dead Man’s Hand” is splattered with red ink to symbolize blood.

Jawbreaker candies are known for their toughness, so Burls Art decided to work with them much like any other building material, sawing and sanding them, then coating them in resin to create a truly sweet “flying V” guitar like no other.

Matt Giles shows off a really nifty way to dress up a room – instead of going with traditional floor tiles, he laid down 27,000 individual pennies (just $270 plus labor) for an amazingly cool look. It’s a time-consuming project, but with enough patience, anyone can do it.

Think you’re good at solving jigsaw puzzles? Check this out. In this time-lapse clip, artist Martin John Callanan painstakingly reconstructs a misprinted British Five Pound note that was shredded into thousands of tiny bits, piecing it back together using a pair of tweezers.

Artist Akinori Goto came up with a truly wonderful take on the zoetrope. He uses 3D printing to turn 2D frames into a donut-shaped object. It looks like an abstract sculpture, but it reveals its animation when hit with a narrow beam of light.

EverBlock’s interlocking plastic blocks are like giant size LEGO bricks, but are sturdy enough to create temporary or semi-permanent partitions, walls, and furniture. They’re also perfect for building playhouses for kids and pets. Play with their online 3D builder here.

Genesis’ Mint is an electric car made for the city. Despite its compact size, it offers a spacious and luxurious interior for two people. Its storage area is accessed via unique scissor doors, and inside it has has a central touchscreen console mounted on its steering wheel.

Slavatech makes USB flash drives that are encased in authentic vacuum tubes. Each one has an LED that lights up when the drive is plugged in. They come in 8GB to 128GB capacities. Touch of Modern has them on sale as of this writing.