Comments on: Wot, no Gorbachev?

Wot, no Gorbachev?

goodnewsfortheinsane — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 11:43:26 -0800

Guess Who? Noma Bar depicts famous faces using symbols of what they are known for as facial features. More samples here (scroll down), and on the publisher's site.

nyt login (if needed): metafilter.com pass: forbaylink Articles from which the larger NYT illustrations were lifted: 1 2 3 4 5

By: Faint of Butt

Faint of Butt — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 11:52:11 -0800

Those eight years of Hebrew school finally paid off! From top to bottom: Osama Bin Laden David Beckham Luciano Pavarotti Uri Geller Ozzy Osbourne Steven Spielberg Woody Allen Amazingly, I even recognized a couple of them without having to read the captions.

By: Faint of Butt

Faint of Butt — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 11:53:20 -0800

And now I find out that the names, in English, are in each image's title attribute. I fail at the Internet.

By: Ambrosia Voyeur

Ambrosia Voyeur — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 12:05:04 -0800

Pretty neat, though some seem pretty forced, like Putin or Ozzy...

By: Astro Zombie

Astro Zombie — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 12:05:41 -0800

Voody Allen.

By: mr_roboto

mr_roboto — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 12:06:04 -0800

I really like this guy's work. There's something old-fashioned about it, and it has a real economy and elegance.

By: goodnewsfortheinsane

goodnewsfortheinsane — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 12:06:27 -0800

Ozzy? I first kind of assumed it was Naomi Klein (!). And I hadn't noticed the mouse-over titles, nor do I read Hebrew. Thanks!

By: kuujjuarapik

kuujjuarapik — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 12:07:39 -0800

Maggie Thatcher was in the Olympics?

By: goodnewsfortheinsane

goodnewsfortheinsane — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 12:08:35 -0800

Also, can someone explain the Woody Allen one for me? I-I-I just don't get it, you know, it's driving me crazy.

By: cortex

cortex — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 12:10:36 -0800

Also, can someone explain the Woody Allen one for me? I-I-I just don't get it, you know, it's driving me crazy. *pulls Noma Bar into the frame* "You know nothing of my work."

By: Astro Zombie

Astro Zombie — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 12:10:46 -0800

Bend it like בקהאם

By: Floydd

Floydd — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 12:20:35 -0800

This face looks familiar.

By: shakespeherian

shakespeherian — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 12:24:40 -0800

By: bullitt 5

bullitt 5 — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 12:27:09 -0800

Interesting. I was really impressed by his John Donne illustration when I saw it in the NYT. Helpful to see his other work...

By: EatTheWeak

EatTheWeak — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 12:49:42 -0800

Wow! These are great!

By: tentacle

tentacle — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 12:55:02 -0800

These are nifty and clever, although the one of Diana kind of rubbed me the wrong way.

By: stagewhisper

stagewhisper — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 13:13:49 -0800

These illustrations are interesting because they serve as examples for how quickly our brains are able to assimilate visual information according to shape relationships when we're trying to recognize other human beings. These caricatures are inexact and minimal in the way the features are presented, yet simple shape relationships (the skull shape, the placement of a nose barring any other defining facial elements) still result in the ability for the viewer to make an educated guess as to who the subject is. This stuff always fascinates me. Another good example of the phenomena of being able to fill in these kinds of blanks with limited information is the ever-popular minipops.

By: goodnewsfortheinsane

goodnewsfortheinsane — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 13:18:18 -0800

shakespeherian: "The Woody Allen one features landmarks from London (the London Eye, etc.). I imagine the illustration accompanied an article about Match Point, as all of a sudden he'd forsaken New York for London as setting." Ah, right, I mistakenly thought it was some sort of clockwork theme.

By: Terminal Verbosity

Terminal Verbosity — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 14:28:20 -0800

The Putin one sure is elegant. But I'd never have guessed who it was. I, too, was wondering what Margaret Thatcher's role with the Olympics was.

By: sveskemus

sveskemus — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 15:03:14 -0800

I thought the top one from the first link was Dick Cheney.

By: naoko

naoko — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 15:07:24 -0800

The Woody Allen one features landmarks from London (the London Eye, etc.). I imagine the illustration accompanied an article about Match Point, as all of a sudden he'd forsaken New York for London as setting. I'm pretty sure it's actually an Annie Hall reference - the bit where Alvy is talking about his childhood on Coney island. Here is an article about this - see the fifth paragraph, about whether the movie was autobiographical or not. I'm pretty sure I remember his house being under the rollercoaster,(not the ferris wheel) in the movie, but there must ahve been something about a ferris wheel too.

By: pax digita

pax digita — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 15:45:58 -0800

...little help here on the "depicts" link?....

By: matthewr

matthewr — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 16:02:32 -0800

The Woody Allen one is definitely London — his nose is the distinctive 'Gherkin' — so the eye must be the Millennium Wheel.

By: misha

misha — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 16:08:29 -0800

I thought Ozzy was Johnny Depp. Seriously. You've got a pirate theme and then what looks like mouse ears... But the Spielberg one is my favorite, because it makes sense and really does look like him.

By: goodnewsfortheinsane

goodnewsfortheinsane — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 17:13:02 -0800

pax digita, it's linked in the [mi].

By: naoko

naoko — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 17:27:16 -0800

Crap, you're right about the Gherkin, matthewr - wow, that thing is ugly. If it weren't for that I would have liked my interpretation better though - has more to do with Woody Allen than London does.

By: goodnewsfortheinsane

goodnewsfortheinsane — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 20:30:09 -0800

Precisely. It must have been an especially-for-Match Point made illustration, else it boggles the mind why it wouldn't have been New York, or anything but London really.

By: sour cream

sour cream — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 23:01:36 -0800

Depicting famous faces is certainly better than defacing famous pictures.

By: pax digita

pax digita — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 04:37:23 -0800

gnfti, I thought that looked like him, but what threw me was the imagery of bombs falling toward a warship -- all I could think of was Pearl Harbor and the war in the Pacific. Eisenhower commanded the Normandy invasion, but there weren't a lot of antiship strikes involved there. Deft artwork but confusing military-history reference.