We are all drawn to fire, entranced by its beauty and ferociousness. Its brilliance draws us in like moths to a candle flame. Thus, many of the celebrations that humans have involve lighting fires. They can be big or small; there could be many little lights or one giant inferno; they may float on water, burn on land, or rise high into the skies. Loi Krathong is a festival that is held each year in Thailand and a number of other places. During this festival thousands of little fires are lighted, presenting a marvelous sight for all the onlookers. It is believed that this tradition is an adaptation of Brahmanical festival, which was adopted by Thai Buddhists to honor Buddha.

Elements of nature are too powerful for humans to subdue, yet it didn’t stop the most courageous individuals from trying. Conquering air, land, fire, water, and even the very fabric of reality – this is the ultimate goal of humanity. For now, we can only marvel at the beauty and tremble in awe before the Mother Nature. A short film “Ocean Gravity,” written and directed by Julie Gautier and Guillaume Nery, reminds us of how small and insignificant a human body is, as it is being swept away by an ocean current. Nevertheless, it never stopped people from attempting to subjugate these unstoppable forces, and someday, maybe the humanity will come out victorious.

There is something strangely appealing about the set of pictures created by Sandro Giordano in a series “In Extremis (Bodies With No Regret)”. Could it be the absurdity of the situation? Or the fact that our brain tries to make up some bizarre story to justify what is happening in the pictures? Of course it is impossible to explain why a pair of tennis players ended up lying flat on the ground with a pack of bananas hanging on the net, even if we forget about the tennis racket lodged in the neck of one of the players. Nevertheless, it is fun to recreate these scenes in your mind just seconds before the tragedy took place. (Photo by Sandro Giordano)

These pictures, made by Joel Strong, look as if a giant hand is pinching the head of a poor Leo. Leo, however, is oblivious to this fact and continues on with his life, taking on a role of everyone from an old granny to a young lady. Thanks to Joel’s skill and sense of humor, the cut out heads of Leonardo DiCaprio, taken from 90s magazines, fit perfectly into the new scenes. If seeing young Leo with a body of an old granny or a fat, half-naked guy in the park doesn’t strike you as funny, we don’t know what will. (Photo by Joel Strong)

The artworks that Alexa Meade makes are very unique and original. A usual painter creates a 2D or a 3D drawing on flat 2D surface. Alexa, on the other hand, draws over the body of a regular person, making them look like a 2D painting. The pictures of these people are almost uncanny, as you realize that the eyes “paintings” are real, and suddenly it dawns upon you that you are seeing a living and breathing human being. It is weird how we perceive this world, and how easy it is to trick our brain into thinking that it’s seeing a two-dimensional object. (Photo by Alexa Meade)

The illustrations created by Joao Carvalho are not just simple 3D drawings. By making it look as if various characters were drawn on regular note book paper, Joao fools our minds into thinking that the flat objects we see on the picture are actually 3-dimentional. To create these pieces of art, Joao first draws the lines of the “notebook” paper already bent, as if they stretch over the object that is about to be drawn. Then he applies shading and his masterpiece is all done! By looking at his pictures it is almost impossible to view them not as simple 2D drawings, but as real 3D objects. (Photo by Joao Desenhos)

HalfPics is a Twitter feed pointing to things cut in half like a bowl of ramen, a Mini Cooper, and toothpaste. Their tagline: “Ever wonder what stuff looks like when it’s cut in half?” Yes. We previously posted about “Cut Food,” a photo series of foods cut neatly in half by food photographer Beth Galton and food stylist Charlotte Omnès.

Artist Victor Nunes combines every-day objects with simple illustrations to turn them into pictures of faces, animals and other playful scenes. His images invite us to look at the world differently and find creative images in our surroundings. Nunes’ art is a great example of pareidolia, which is our propensity to give meaning to random objects (like in this post about seeing faces in random objects). It’s the reason why we associate a smiley face with a human face and why some of Nunes’ pieces of popcorn or bread resemble faces to us.