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This ‘Metal Gate’ In France Is Actually An Optical Illusion

Award winning street art optical illusion in France

An impressive Trompe-l-oeil fresco painting created in the coastal city of Boulogne-Sur-Mer has recently been termed as France’s most beautiful street artwork for 2020.

Each year, a famous French portal designated to urban art entertains a national competition to crown France’s most amazing and eye-catching street art. Thousands of people cast their votes. For the last year’s award, the title went to an amazing artwork painted by Spanish street artist Gonzalo Borondo on the city’s rue Jules Baudelocque last summer. From the right angle, it looks like a complex metal gate, having detailed bas-reliefs on either side, but a closer look shows that it is just an optical illusion.

Situated on the humungous staircase on rue Jules-Baudelocque in a traditional district of Boulogne-sur-mer, Borondo’s Fresco seems like a story of life, according to Abid Amziane, the head of the city’s street-art festival.

Amziane said, “You first see a closed door, and you may think that in life everything is closed. But by going up on each step, you reach stages, like consciousness or free will. And at the seventh and last level, you understand that life has just started and that you should never let go.”

The fun part is that the painting is not complete yet. Due to rainy days in abundance in the last season, the famous artist could do wonders with his art-skills only four days a week. It was planned that work on this painting would continue until finished. However, now it is expected to complete at the end of this year. Never heard of an unfinished work winning a substantial award. I wonder what it would be once it gets complete.

Gonzalo Borondo is a well-known street artist whose work adorns streets and buildings worldwide, but this win definitely adds more to his name.

“It is well deserved. It is great recognition for the artist, for the city, and us,” Amziane said. “He is in great demand, but the objective is to see him here again very soon.”

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