Artist Dino Tomic creates detailed drawings using a material that’s a staple of any cupboard: table salt. Filling a plastic squirt bottle with the ubiquitous granular substance, he gets down on his hands and knees to form an eye and eyebrow on a giant piece of black paper. Tomic varies the amount of salt he applies, giving his artwork a balance of light and dark areas as well as a sense of realism. Considering how unpredictable salt granules can be, his attention to detail and ability to control the material is nothing short of impressive.
After Tomic finished creating the eye, he snapped a photo and applied a special effect that completely transforms how we view the image. Using manipulation software, he inverted all of the colors, which reversed what was black and what was white. This has a profound impact on the picture, and it suddenly looks like a graphite drawing rather than one made from salt.
Watch the making of this incredible piece, below.
Tomic has created other detailed works using salt: