Some German’s art project is to engage in “urban camouflage” by creating three different ghillie suits made of bulk IKEA items: piles of dishcloths, boxes, and shopping bags. Then he goes and “hides” out in the open inside the IKEA, blending in with his surroundings and only disturbing shoppers when he moves. Hilarious, brilliant! Here are the videos so you get the full effect:
URBANCAMOUFLAGE [Official Site] (Thanks to c-side!)
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Reason #194501 that I don’t get “art”
@TracyHamandEggs:
this particular art is about disturbing minds and using some kind of “military stuff” for any day amusement
i actually get and enjoy THIS art
@TracyHamandEggs:
Reason #19451 that I don’t get Germans.
I think this is pretty damned cool.
Watch the videos on the urbancamouflage site. They are well worth it.
Just look at all the things you can do when you dont have a job! Thats what we need is the +8 million jobless to go out and just start screwing with everyone else
This seems like a good time to show this. I want it for trips to the park.
lol Reminds me of bushman here in San Francisco. He always makes me chuckle.
@Cat_In_A_Hat:
I haven’t thought about the bushman in a long time. That dude is funny.
@Franklin Comes Alive!:
And apparently he has his own Wikipedia entry!
[en.wikipedia.org]
@Cat_In_A_Hat: Is he still doing that? Good fun!
Its funny as hell but I am curious why they did it? Was it for the fun? Is there an article that I have not read yet?
It would have been a lot cooler if he jumped out and scared the crap out of shoppers.
@Jay Dutton: Or was sniping people in the butt with an airsoft marker.
@Jay Dutton: Yes! I was sort of disappointed with those videos… I wanted to see people jump or scream or something…
@Jay Dutton:
I was surprised by the apparent lack of customers. Maybe he did this in the morning when they first opened? I’ve never seen an Ikea that empty.
@Jay Dutton: I think the point is more to highlight the vast inconsequential nature of all of the piles of consumer goods and their associated refuse surrounding anyone at any given moment. It’s more meaningful in that context to have people just walk past and not notice, or be vaguely curious about slow movement and be forced to think about the giant pile of X, than it is to play a childish game of BOO.
If the point was to spook people, I’m sure he’d have lots of videos of himself doing that. That’s not the point, and actually counterproductive to the point I believe he’s trying to make.
i saw the set of pictures a couple of days ago, didn’t realize there was video too. For some reason, seeing the video makes it seem a lot less interesting.
I kept waiting for him to scare someone. Although the box person did make that lady turn around and go the other way.
I’ve always wondered why computer screens or TV screens sometimes flicker when caught on camera. Anyone care to explain?
@Mike8813: TVs appear to the human eye as a constant image, but are actually refreshing itself about 30 times a second, usually redrawing from top to bottom. Cameras shoot about 30 frames per second, sometimes, the camera is shooting faster or out of sync with the refresh rate and “catches” the TV mid refresh. This gives the effect you describe.
@DaddyMagicBritches: Thanks! You’re my hero.
CRTs (computer screens or TV screens) will appear to flicker when caught on camera because the Cathode Ray (The CR in CRT) actually redraws the phosphors of the tube (screen) by quickly scanning across and down many times a second, constantly refreshing the image by making the phosphor dots glow. The speed of drawing is the “refresh rate”.
To a human eye, this looks like a continuous image, but when captured by a video camera, often the frame rate of the camera isn’t quite the same as the “refresh rate” of the screen, and so the camera catches the screen in between redraws, thus the “flicker”.
A similar effect is why some people get headaches when using CRT computer monitors under fluorescent lighting.
@ChicagoKev: Which is why you should turn up the refresh rate of your CRT monitor as high as you can (assuming image looks OK).
I can’t count the number of people with PCs running at 60Hz at my office building (which still has a lot of CRTs) because IT is too dumb to know it causes eye fatigue. I’ll change it for people I know, and they always say it makes it SO much easier to look at the screen.
This made me laugh sooo much…I loved the dishrag one much better than the box one though.
I kept waiting for him to freak someone out, that would have been hilarious but he never did.
@pixiegirl1: Agreed.
I think the closest he went was when a passerby did a quick double take.
@pixiegirl1: Yeah, this would have been 10 times cooler if he tried to scare someone. Just a “boo” would have been nice.
What IKEA is this? There’s like no one there. Mine is always packed…
@David Eckert: I recently went to IKEA Carson @ 6pm on a weekday. It was a ghost town!
Still busy on the weekends, though
Consider me amused! I like how people just move in the opposite direction and try to ignore the giant moving pile of boxes or dishrags.
Super cool idea, but where are the customers?
Hmm.. maybe I should give art another chance. I kinda gave up on it after the self-portrait incident of ’98.
Was that a big box of shamwows? The carnie on TV says they are made in Germany.
It would have been more interesting had there been people around to actually experience it, rather than him doing it mostly alone.
“Just look at all the things you can do when you dont have a job! Thats what we need is the +8 million jobless to go out and just start screwing with everyone else
”
Uh, this guy HAS a job, doing viral marketing for Ikea.
(reply doesn’t seem to be working)
Yet another reason not to scratch your butt when you THINK your alone.lol
I never really did get modern art.
I want those 4 minutes back
Not art.
The first one wasn’t funny to me and the second one only mildly funny. It would have been hilarious if the person in the costume had raised up and scared the beejesus out of shoppers.
I’m more amazed by the lack of people at an IKEA. Maybe I need to take a trip to the IKEA Dusselholf.
That’s an IKEA in Sweden, according to the video description on the youtube page…and it’s possible it’s early in the morning or later at night. In any case, it’s also possible not everyone is as fascinated with IKEA in Sweden as they are here in the US.
Can anyone confirm that it’s in Sweden? I can’t tell if the price signs have a dollar sign or something else.
Haha, we just had a “housewarming party” in one of ikea’s living spaces. [improveverywhere.ning.com]
The one with the towels doesn’t happen at an Ikea — it’s clearly a grocery store.
that is too funny
I’m glad he didn’t scare people. The goal was camouflage, not lame Candid Camera pranks.
@ Brent – exactly – if he’d been very still and jumping out, it would pretty much just be lacking Alan Funt.
that was kinda stupid.
lol what if the terrorists and pedophiles find out about this?;)
How come I didn’t see any question marks over the head of shopper when she saw the pile of boxes moving?
This makes me think of the movie Toys (with Robin Williams). LL Cool J’s character was really good at blending in anywhere.
This is not art. This is a dumb ass doing what it does best. Being a dumb ass.
I completely cracked up at the woman in video 2. She sees the boxes shuffling away, and just very slowly turns and goes the other way.