Playing With Reality (8 Photos)

Walls, corners and stumps become street art illusions

A man peers over a concrete wall. A beaver takes a coffee break inside a tree stump. A tunnel becomes an eye, a chameleon wears the wall’s bricks, and a woman looks out through broken plaster. These eight artworks borrow real edges, openings and trees to give painted scenes somewhere to live.

More: Street Art That Plays Tricks on Your Mind

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👀 Behind the Wall — By CHEONE

His eyes, teeth and fingertips crowd the edge of the wall. CHEONE uses the real concrete boundary to make the painted man seem close enough to lean into the street.

💡 Technique Fact: Cheone is self-taught and spent about seven years studying light and shadow to refine his realistic technique, according to his gallery biography.

More: Amazing 3D Murals by CHEONE!

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🚐 Caravan Corner — By Odeith

Two flat concrete walls become a caravan with a rounded front and a window to lean through. The real corner gives Odeith’s painted vehicle its apparent depth.

💡 Technique Fact: Odeith’s official biography dates his signature anamorphic corner and floor-to-wall compositions to 2005.

More: How to Paint a Caravan on Concrete

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☕ Coffee Break — By David Zinn

A flat tree stump becomes a deep little room, complete with a beaver and a cup of coffee. David Zinn draws the dark interior around the character while the real bark forms the rim.

More: David Zinn’s Hidden Chalk Art

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👁️ La mirada construida — By David Villaécija in Spain 🇪🇸

The pupil is a real tunnel. David Villaécija paints the eyelids around its circular entrance, while the small opening at the far end adds a point of light inside the eye.

🔗 Follow David Villaécija on Instagram

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🦎 Brick Camo — By Paddy Watts

The chameleon wears the same brick pattern as the wall, but the lines bend around its body. Paddy Watts places it across a real corner, with a curled tail and outstretched feet that seem to sit in front of the bricks.

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🧱 Through the Wall — By Martín Ron in Buenos Aires, Argentina 🇦🇷

A yellow hat and an enormous face appear behind the wall’s missing plaster. Martín Ron uses the exposed brick and irregular edges as the opening, leaving the woman looking out through the building.

More: Murals by Martín Ron

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🦋 The Nine — By Mantra in Little Rock, Arkansas, USA 🇺🇸

Mantra turns the building into a giant specimen case, with shadows and cracked glass around nine butterflies. The project features species emblematic of Arkansas, as documented by its curator, Justkids.

💡 Artist Fact: Mantra is both an artist and a naturalist; his fascination with entomology grew from memories of his childhood garden in France, according to his gallery biography.

More: Mantra’s Butterfly Murals

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🤗 Hugging the Tree

The pot and the child are painted; the tree is real. Its trunk lines up with the orange pot, turning a tree behind the wall into something the child can carry.

More: Art from Nature: Trees and Paint

The giant behind the wall, the beaver’s coffee break, or another illusion? Tell us which one you would stop for.