noma bar visual awesomeness

i was recently bought two books for my birthday, one that i had seen and expressed an interest in and one that i hadn't even heard of, these books where by a graphic designer by the name of noma bar, now i had only seen very brief section of one of the books and didn't really know what to expect, what i got was like someone turning on a light and punching me in the face, the two books where "negative space" and "guess who", both of these books are just incredible.

 

i haven't been able to find out that much information about noma, except that he was born in israel in 1973 and has worked for some incredible and very notable clients, such as time out london, bbc, the observer and wallpaper to name a few, he has published over 550 illustrations, illustrated over 60 magazine covers and released the two aforementioned books (thank you wikipedia).  now that we have covered some background, i can try a show you some of the visual delights that completely blew my mind when i first opened these books.

 

nomas use of negative space and related items is incredible, its just a completely different way of looking at things, i wonder if this is how he sees real life, as incredibly clever but beautifully simple illustrations. the above images are from the "guess who" book, where he create portraits of famous people, each one instantly recognisable and created using images that epitomise their fame.

these images have all been taking from the book "negative space" which is the book i origiinally saw and wanted, but i could never have imagined how brilliant these two books are. negative space shows you an entirely different way of looking at things, you notice more elements each time you look at it, and it still blows my mind. even down to the cover, you see the dog, then you see the cat and then you see the mouse, brilliant.

i cannot recommend these two books enough

heres a link to buy negative space, you should be able to get them both in a bundle displayed on this page but i dont know how to link to that.

heres a link to the artica.com profile for noma

if you have any other information on noma, please let me know

as an extra bonus, heres one of my favourite illustrations