Beyond making the meals I try (and fail) to whip up even remotely bearable, I don’t have much use for table salt.
Especially when it comes to creating art. Always failing to think outside the box, I tend to stick to graphite and charcoal when it’s time to crank out another portrait, but artist Dino Tomic has proved once and for all that atypical materials yield atypical results. While his more traditional work is impressive, it’s what he does with table salt that cannot be missed.
Using massive canvases and the stuff you have in that cute shaker on your kitchen table, he produces works of art that stun viewers when seen with the naked eye and baffle them when passed through an inverted filter.
By placing salt in squeeze bottles that are usually reserved for mustard and ketchup, he draws gorgeous pieces with millions of tiny grains.
Similar to the process of creating Tibetan sand mandalas, Tomic’s approach requires a steady hand and careful breathing to ensure that each grain stays where it belongs.
Other artists create similar pieces by drawing with white charcoal on black paper, but Tomic prefers to defy creative conventions.
Although this role reversal of shading and highlighting is gorgeous on its own, watch what happens when he inverts some of his images.
In the blink of an eye, each one transforms into its tonal opposite, mimicking the look of a pencil drawing.
Seeing Dino Tomic in action is an experience that’s in a league of its own.
From inception to completion, every step in his artistic process is as satisfying as the final reveal.
To learn more about Dino Tomic’s work, be sure to check out his website. For regular updates, keep up with him on DeviantArt, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube.
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