this art installation lets you poke, inflate, or add a disco ball to famous paintings

created by los angeles based artist, neil mendoza, ‘mechanical masterpieces’ is an art installation that reimagines classical paintings for the 21st century. optimized for short attention spans, it allows viewers to poke, inflate, add water, or even a disco ball to their heart’s content. the interactive work was created for the children’s museum of pittsburgh as part of it’s ‘tough art’ residency.

images and main video courtesy of neil mendoza

the installation includes five famous paintings. these include renowned works by american artists like norman rockwell and grant wood, and dutch post-impressionist painter, vincent van gogh. 

neil mendoza is an artist exploring themes of the absurd, the humorous, the futile and the surreal. his work combines sculpture, electronics and software to bring inanimate objects and spaces to life.

project info:

project name: mechanical masterpieces

location: children’s museum of pittsburgh, pennsylvania

artist: neil mendoza

designboom has received this project from our ‘DIY submissions‘ feature, where we welcome our readers to submit their own work for publication. see more project submissions from our readers here.