Some genius is adding googly eyes to rusty street objects in Bulgaria
2024-05-27 18:24:04

Post-socialist cities like Sofia in Bulgaria, aren't known for their architectural diversity. They tend to be a bit monotonous. And rusty. Very rusty.

SEE ALSO:This city has no monuments to women so an artist did a colourful shake-up

But when you add googly eyes (aka eyebombing) to cities rumbling ruins gain a certain charm.

Mashable ImageOOO-ways look on the bright side of life.Credit: Eyebombing BUlgaria

Photographer Vanyu Krastev, 42, has been eyebombing Sofia over the past two years, breathing life in the most unexpected places.

His project got a flurry of attention in Bulgaria after an article in Bored Panda and now there are much more eyeballs on it (geddit?).

Mashable ImageWaka waka waka waka.Credit: eyebombing bulgaria

Krastev is hoping that it will develop into a grassroots movement, where people geolocate themselves moving around the city and follow the lead of other eyebombers.

Mashable ImageA plastic smile.Credit: EYEBalling Bulgaria

Like many capital cities in Europe, parking is a nightmare In Sofia. There are cars everywhere. Especially sidewalks. So the city is littered with a variety of stony sculptures that function as barriers. What better place to put some googly eyes?

Mashable Image"You should see the other guy."Credit: EYebombing Bulgaria

And that's the point. Finding beauty in anything, both animate and inanimate, is a matter of perspective.

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Krastev says he can't unsee that beauty anymore. The plastic googly eyes, just like the ones on most Sesame Streetcharacters, are a filter through which he can mould the city and make it come to life.

Mashable ImageAn urban Rorschach test.Credit: EYEBOMBING BULGARIA

"I bought a few of these plastic eyes and decided to try it in Sofia. I noticed no one had done it before (in Bulgaria) and I went from there," Krastev said.

"The more eyes I stuck on things, the better I became. I got a sort of flair for it. Nowadays, I don't even need to go on a specific 'eybombing hunt' around Sofia. The little creatures just kind of pop out all around me."

Mashable Image"I may be rusty, but I'm still beautiful."Credit: eyebombing bulgaria

Krastev was inspired by the two Danish masters of the street art initiative, who describe it as an "effort to define and refine a largely neglected and overlooked" part of everyday life – the urban aesthetic.

And their methodology is simple – create weirdly gleeful creatures from inanimate objects, which in turn bring equally wide smiles to people passing by.

Mashable Image"Don't look down on me."Credit: EYEBOMBING BULGARIA

Sofia is a particularly good canvas for this sort of installation because the best eyebombing works with things that are "broken, ruptured, punctured, tangled, crumbling, or twisted," Krastev says. "You are, in a way, humanizing them."

These's an abundance in the city and once you look at them through the googly eyes filter, it's kind of an inspiration.

Mashable Image"Cookie, cookie, cookie, cookie!"Credit: EYEBOMBING BULGARIAMashable ImageA real mouthful.Credit: eyebombing bulgaria

Proof that beauty and life is everywhere.


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