Ryan and Trevor Oakes (born 1982)[1](also referred to as the Oakes Brothers or Oakes Twins) are identical twin American artists and draftsmen best known for collaborative large scale drawings using a concave gridded
easel.[2] They create
camera obscura exact drawings using an easel which they devised and built.[3] Their drawings, paintings, and sculptures explore the intersection of art and mathematics.[4]
Early life and education
Born in 1982 to social worker Larry Oakes and academic Elizabeth Poe. They attended art school at
Cooper Union.[5]
Work
Using their self-designed easel they render a scene on a curved sheet of paper by tracing what is in front of them onto that page freehand, as if using a camera obscura or a camera lucida projection, only they use no equipment only their own binocular vision or more precisely their visual cortex, which allows them to trace a "ghost" image that appears before them.[5]
Their drawings are often site specific and are often completed in public spaces where the artists engage with onlookers and answer questions about their unique technique. Locations include
The Getty Center in
Los Angeles and
Cloud Gate in
Chicago.[6][7][8]