The full 360 degrees in all directions
April 27, 2017 7:12 AM Subscribe
What you are seeing when you look at a Termesphere® painting is an optical illusion. An inside-out view of the total physical world around you on the outside surface of a hanging and rotating sphere. If you were on the inside of this sphere, this painted image around you would seem normal, but it is read from the outside.
Dick Termes, a South Dakota-based painter uses six point perspective to capture all 306 degrees of scenes ranging from the real to the geometrically fantastical:
-Wrigley Field
-Emptiness
While the visual illusion is difficult to capture in two dimensions, Termes has provided a Spherical Thinking Web Demo (YT) that shows several of his spheres rotating.
Dick Termes, a South Dakota-based painter uses six point perspective to capture all 306 degrees of scenes ranging from the real to the geometrically fantastical:
-Wrigley Field
-Emptiness
While the visual illusion is difficult to capture in two dimensions, Termes has provided a Spherical Thinking Web Demo (YT) that shows several of his spheres rotating.
Difficult? I think you mean IMPOSSIBLE to capture in two dimensions. The web demo is the only way they make any sense at all, but there they are neat.
posted by yhbc at 8:43 AM on April 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by yhbc at 8:43 AM on April 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
Yeah, these are amazing — but I had no idea what I was looking at until I watched the video.
posted by OverlappingElvis at 8:45 AM on April 27, 2017
posted by OverlappingElvis at 8:45 AM on April 27, 2017
Dick Termes is a long-time friend of my family's (my parents were friends with him long before I was born). I can confidently say he's among the three most brilliant people I've ever met. Imagine being around the people who were inventing two-point perspective. That's what watching his work is like.
The way that you feel like you're inside the painting is hard to show in a video. It's an amazing feeling. My dad has a funny story about standing behind two older men watching a Termesphere. One of them was freaking out, saying things like, "Did you see that? That painting just... changed."
I've heard him do his six-point perspective talk a few times. It's so elegant the way that he explains it, but I would have a lot of trouble trying to explain it to anyone else. I have little flashes of clarity, where I think I'm seeing how it works the way that he sees it. I wonder if it's similar to scientists who deeply understand relativity. They can really see it; the rest of us have to rely on abstraction.
Growing up in South Dakota, he (not to mention his wife Markie Scholz, also a very gifted artist) represented a different strain from most local artists. Even as a small child, it was obvious to me that he was really pushing at the boundaries in a way that not many local artists were. I remember being in their house (a geodesic dome that they designed and built themselves) and thinking, this is the most creativity I've ever been around.
But at the same time, his art is so South Dakota, with prairies and hills and Native American religious imagery. Sometimes when I talk to other people my age from SD, they'll even be a little embarrassed about Termes. Everyone met him on a field trip at some point, or had a unit about him in their art classes. They forget how special he is until they come across his work again as an adult, and again have that feeling of the painting changing.
posted by roll truck roll at 10:44 AM on April 27, 2017 [10 favorites]
The way that you feel like you're inside the painting is hard to show in a video. It's an amazing feeling. My dad has a funny story about standing behind two older men watching a Termesphere. One of them was freaking out, saying things like, "Did you see that? That painting just... changed."
I've heard him do his six-point perspective talk a few times. It's so elegant the way that he explains it, but I would have a lot of trouble trying to explain it to anyone else. I have little flashes of clarity, where I think I'm seeing how it works the way that he sees it. I wonder if it's similar to scientists who deeply understand relativity. They can really see it; the rest of us have to rely on abstraction.
Growing up in South Dakota, he (not to mention his wife Markie Scholz, also a very gifted artist) represented a different strain from most local artists. Even as a small child, it was obvious to me that he was really pushing at the boundaries in a way that not many local artists were. I remember being in their house (a geodesic dome that they designed and built themselves) and thinking, this is the most creativity I've ever been around.
But at the same time, his art is so South Dakota, with prairies and hills and Native American religious imagery. Sometimes when I talk to other people my age from SD, they'll even be a little embarrassed about Termes. Everyone met him on a field trip at some point, or had a unit about him in their art classes. They forget how special he is until they come across his work again as an adult, and again have that feeling of the painting changing.
posted by roll truck roll at 10:44 AM on April 27, 2017 [10 favorites]
the bit on six-point perspective is very interesting, thanks for sharing.
posted by rebent at 11:04 AM on April 27, 2017 [2 favorites]
posted by rebent at 11:04 AM on April 27, 2017 [2 favorites]
Needs more Quicktime™VR®.
Dude's got balls. I mean, sphe®es. Where does one get such fabulous things? It seems ©umbersome for the artist to have to assemble one each time.
Interesting that Te®mes has invented the term "six-point pe®spective"™ appa®ently.
©olo® me un$u®p®is€d that the a®ti$t wa$ in$pi®€d b¥ €$©h€r.
posted by Ogre Lawless at 11:08 AM on April 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
Dude's got balls. I mean, sphe®es. Where does one get such fabulous things? It seems ©umbersome for the artist to have to assemble one each time.
Interesting that Te®mes has invented the term "six-point pe®spective"™ appa®ently.
©olo® me un$u®p®is€d that the a®ti$t wa$ in$pi®€d b¥ €$©h€r.
posted by Ogre Lawless at 11:08 AM on April 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
If it helps, imagine reality as a sphere extending into n-dimensions with an infinite radius. Then you will understand.
posted by blue_beetle at 11:46 AM on April 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by blue_beetle at 11:46 AM on April 27, 2017 [1 favorite]
I'm still trying to figure out how to get the 6th vanishing point set up behind my monitor.
posted by JoeZydeco at 11:59 AM on April 27, 2017
posted by JoeZydeco at 11:59 AM on April 27, 2017
Fascinating! Might someone identify the delicate acoustic guitar solo accompanying the Spherical Thinking Web Demo? Thanks.
posted by gregoreo at 4:05 PM on April 27, 2017
posted by gregoreo at 4:05 PM on April 27, 2017
Gordy Pratt, another SD celebrity.
posted by roll truck roll at 4:28 PM on April 27, 2017
posted by roll truck roll at 4:28 PM on April 27, 2017
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posted by saulgoodman at 7:24 AM on April 27, 2017