Core77

See the World Differently through Eyebombing

By Ray Hu - February 27, 2012

in Object Culture

Nope, it's not a new version of the EyeWriter: "Eyebombing" is a far more low-tech—and perhaps expressly meme-friendly—form of urban intervention.

Kim Nielsen and Peter Dam coined the term late last year: "Eyebombing is the act of setting googly eyes on inanimate things in the public space. Ultimately the goal is to humanize the streets, and bring sunshine to people passing by." Their intentions are contrary to those of traditional tags, which Nielsen and Dam see as "egocentric behavior... using vandalism to [get respect]"; eyebombing is "only about the message itself."It's not a fight for the public space, it's to be seen as a lovely addition to that space. An addition that hopefully brings a smile, and brightens someones day. The eyebomber use humor and wit to reach its audience, not vandalism or provocation.

We're certainly past the point of crass Krylon tags—see Marko Manriquez's "fight for the public space" (and no disrespect to Katsu, of course)—but Eyebombing is unique in that it is a simple yet uncanny diversion from the mundane fixtures of the post-industrial world. Where Yarn Bombing, a similarly absurd variant of street art, is characterized by tactility and a sort of Oldenburgian scale that ultimately comes across as rather abstract, Eyebombing is altogether Tweet-like in brevity (suffice it to say that Tumblr is the proper venue for the movement). The fact that it's frivolous and disposable is precisely the point... after all, there may come a day when "googly eyes" refers to a certain search engine's panoptical data mining service.

Like David Barry's Kickstarted coathooks, the phenomenon echoes a 2009 AmEx spot in which inanimate objects go anthropomorphic, reminding us once again that the best facial recognition software is the human imagination.

Speaking of which, I was also reminded of Wu Yulu's robots (above) and a series of photos by artist Brock Davis, created as part of his awesome year-long project to "Make Something Cool Every Day: 2009" (below).

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Steph McL

12 years ago

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I've been doing this for a couple years, with ridiculous results. Mostly I "lick 'em and stick 'em" and then take them with me when I've properly documented the escapade but a friend made me magnetic ones for Christmas this year, so I can get a little more creative on metal surfaces! .
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Moka

12 years ago

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nice! such a great kit idea!

here's s'more googly eye fun: http://www.flickr.com/photos/moekah/sets/72157626299224567/with/5587250075/

reported on by missionmission: http://www.missionmission.org/2011/04/05/invasion-of-the-googly-eyes/
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Gary

12 years ago

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Put them on Urinals. if there is more then one leave one with out.
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Rain

12 years ago

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Do they clean these up after they're done? These plastic googly eyes might serve to entertain people, but the lame adhesive on the back eventually wears off and it's our environment and animals that have to deal with it. I'm not sure if brightening someone's day with some googly eye action is really worth a millennium of environmental repercussions. Eventually it's just trash on the street.
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Steve Portigal

12 years ago

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Check out this piece I wrote here on 2002, about a product for adding eyes to things: Meary
http://www.core77.com/reactor/meary.html
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Jessica S.

12 years ago

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Looks like fun, but how can we discuss googly eyes as an "urban intervention" without mentioning Christopher Walken's brilliant "Googly Eyes Gardner" on SNL four years ago?! You can't know where you stand with your plants (or urban environment?) unless you can look them in the eye! (The sketch is on Hulu for those in the U.S., and very much worth looking up.)
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wcraghead

12 years ago

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Very cool - I started doing this several years ago after seeing it on Wooster and some other street art sites. Never heard it called eyebombing though - great word.
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