BAR-CODE PICASSO

Visionary artist create masterpieces from packaging

When you look at Bill Gate’s mug, what do you see? If you’re like most of us, you see a cheap-looking pair of LensCrafters frames straddling the world’s richest nose and the perfect target for extortion, what with his weak children running around unguarded. Scott Blake, however, isn’t like most of us. "I took one look at him," the 25-year old artist says, and knew he’d look awesome as bar codes."
For several years, Blake has made portraits from bar codes using a computer program he designed himself. "It takes the computers a weekend to de each one. Originally, I pieced the pictures together with any old bar codes I could find… like ones from packs of gum," he explains. "But now I only use ones that are relevant to my subjects. I did Oprah with codes from the books she recommends." Where did he get the ones for Gates? Off a douche bag perhaps? "No, I used the tags from Microsoft products." Oh well.

www.barcodeart.com