Eyebombing

2011photo blog / street artclassic

Eyebombing is a street-art practice where people stick googly eyes on inanimate objects in public spaces, turning fire hydrants, mailboxes, and lamp posts into little faces. Two Danish artists coined the name in October 2011 when they registered eyebombing.com and set the rule that only wiggle eyes on public objects count.

eyebombingphoto fad memessingle serving site memesearly 2010s memespre digital memes

Overview

Eyebombing is the act of sticking a pair of wiggle eyes on an inanimate object in a public space so the object appears to have a face. Fire hydrants, mailboxes, parking meters, drainpipes, and broken sidewalk fixtures are common targets, and photos of the results are shared online1.

The practice was formally defined and named by two Danish artists who set two strict rules for what counts: the eyes must be physical googly eyes (not drawn or Photoshopped), and the object must be found in public rather than staged at home2. That definition separates eyebombing from earlier googly-eye photo projects that used household junk3.

How It Spread

Laughing Squid picked up the site on December 2nd, 2011, giving eyebombing its first outside press1. Gawker covered it later that month and noted that the Danish pair were tightening the format around older, looser googly-eye blogs like All Googly and Googly Eyes on Stuff4.

Coverage widened through 2012. The Mary Sue ran a feature on the trend5, and design site Core77 wrote about the aesthetic appeal of giving cast-iron street furniture a personality6. Craft-focused outlets like Make and Takes and lifestyle blogs including The Pioneer Woman followed, pushing the idea to a non-art audience3.

On Tumblr, users collected submissions under the tags #eyebomb, #eyebombers and #eyebombing, and a Facebook fan page plus Pinterest pinboards became secondary hubs3. The single-topic-blog format kept eyebombing alive as a low-effort street project long after the initial press cycle.

How to Use This Meme

The typical eyebomb involves buying a bag of self-adhesive wiggle eyes, walking around a neighborhood, and pressing a pair onto anything with two features that could pass as eye sockets. Common targets include bolts on fire hydrants, ventilation grilles, tree knots, and rusted padlocks. The convention set by eyebombing.com is that the eyes are physical, the surface is public, and the photograph is taken in place rather than staged2.

Frequently Asked Questions

Eyebombing

2011photo blog / street artclassic

Eyebombing is a street-art practice where people stick googly eyes on inanimate objects in public spaces, turning fire hydrants, mailboxes, and lamp posts into little faces. Two Danish artists coined the name in October 2011 when they registered eyebombing.com and set the rule that only wiggle eyes on public objects count.

eyebombing photo fad memes single serving site memes early 2010s memes pre digital memes

Overview

Eyebombing is the act of sticking a pair of wiggle eyes on an inanimate object in a public space so the object appears to have a face. Fire hydrants, mailboxes, parking meters, drainpipes, and broken sidewalk fixtures are common targets, and photos of the results are shared online1.

The practice was formally defined and named by two Danish artists who set two strict rules for what counts: the eyes must be physical googly eyes (not drawn or Photoshopped), and the object must be found in public rather than staged at home2. That definition separates eyebombing from earlier googly-eye photo projects that used household junk3.

How It Spread

Laughing Squid picked up the site on December 2nd, 2011, giving eyebombing its first outside press1. Gawker covered it later that month and noted that the Danish pair were tightening the format around older, looser googly-eye blogs like All Googly and Googly Eyes on Stuff4.

Coverage widened through 2012. The Mary Sue ran a feature on the trend5, and design site Core77 wrote about the aesthetic appeal of giving cast-iron street furniture a personality6. Craft-focused outlets like Make and Takes and lifestyle blogs including The Pioneer Woman followed, pushing the idea to a non-art audience3.

On Tumblr, users collected submissions under the tags #eyebomb, #eyebombers and #eyebombing, and a Facebook fan page plus Pinterest pinboards became secondary hubs3. The single-topic-blog format kept eyebombing alive as a low-effort street project long after the initial press cycle.

How to Use This Meme

The typical eyebomb involves buying a bag of self-adhesive wiggle eyes, walking around a neighborhood, and pressing a pair onto anything with two features that could pass as eye sockets. Common targets include bolts on fire hydrants, ventilation grilles, tree knots, and rusted padlocks. The convention set by eyebombing.com is that the eyes are physical, the surface is public, and the photograph is taken in place rather than staged2.

Frequently Asked Questions