When it comes to calligraphy puzzles, few have Xu Bing’s creativity beat. Bing, an artist, sculptor, and printmaker, has released a new book titled Look! What Do You See? and has been so kind as to share one of his latest puzzles. His work is unlike anything you’ve ever seen before; he writes English words stylized as in Chinese characters, creating a perplexing hybrid which might baffle any standard puzzle-solver. He calls his invention “Square Word Calligraphy.”
But if you squint your eyes and bit and maybe do a bit of head turning, you can figure it out. His book applies his distinctive calligraphic style to popular Chinese and American songs. Can you figure out the popular American tune below? There’s a hint in the paired illustration.
Still stumped? Not everyone’s a fan of baseball or English characters stylized like Asian texts, so it’s understandable. The song scrawled above is “Take Me Out to the Ball Game” by Jack Norworth and Albert Von Tilzer.
Now that we’ve got you thinking about peanuts and Cracker Jack, are you hungry for more challenges?
