Phlegm Creates an Op Art Mural for the Boombarstick Festival in Croatia

Phlegm or M.C. Escher?

Photo Removed
Complex Original

Blank pixel used during image takedowns

Photo Removed

As part of Boombarstick, an urban arts and music festival in Vodnjan, Croatia, British street artist Phlegm has created a fantastic Op art mural on an abandoned cinema. Painting architecture on architecture, the artist imagines a symmetrical array of stairs illustrated around the windows and doors of the building. The Croatian structure was originally a church later turned into a theater. Although the theater has fallen from use, Phlegm has infused new life into the decrepit building with this mural. Phlegm's work envisions a space beyond the flat surface of the building, which from afar seems to exist in three dimensions. It's impossible not to see the parallels between this trompe l'oeil work and M.C. Escher's stair optical illusion. Phlegm used pens and markers to complete the piece, painting for approximately 10 hours each for five days under the extreme heat of the Mediterranean sun. While we can only imagine how hot it was for Phlegm, his work speaks for itself.

[via Arrested Motion]

RELATED: The Best Murals of 2013 (So Far)

Latest in Style