Heads-UP! #62: From Expensive Toy Cars to Convincing Optical Illusions

Welcome to our latest Heads-UP! a round-up of fun, interesting and sometimes downright weird facts!

  • The scream of the Ice Dragon of Game of Thrones is actually made out drunk fans screams. Indeed Paula Fairfield, the GOT sound designer confirmed that she found the best candidates at the Burlington Bar in Chicago, well known to organise GOT parties. – Lisa

 

  • The hot wheels Camaro costs $38,790! Yes, that’s right for a toy car… – Lynn

 

  • In 1911, the Joconde went missing. Sixty detectives were assigned the case and conspiracy theories abounded. The authorities paid little attention to Vincenzo Peruggia, the Italian laborer who had created the protective glass around Leonardo da Vinci’s masterpiece. He was questioned twice and let go. Two years later, Mr. Peruggia tried to sell the painting to Giovanni Poggi, the director of the Uffizi Gallery in Florence. Mr. Poggi immediately called the police. Today, the painting is protected by bulletproof glass and an alarm system that goes off it anyone tries to even touch the frame – Cécile

 

  • Giphy and Squarespace collaborated to launch a film festival exclusively dedicated to GIFs. – Victoria I

 

  • Last week, an optical illusion made by the famed British artist Anish Kapoor proved a little too convincing when a man fell into a large hole the artist painted with black pigment to look like a flat circle. It’s unclear exactly how the 60-year-old Italian gentleman wound up tumbling into the eight-foot pit—especially considering there are caution signs set up all around the piece, not to mention a staffer tasked with keeping visitors safe. The artwork in question is Kapoor’s 1992 installation Descent into Limbo. The piece predates Kapoor famously securing exclusive rights to the blackest black pigment in the world, Surrey Nanosystems’ nanocarbon-based Vantablack, by over two decades. Staring into the circle is supposed to provoke contemplation of the void, and perhaps get the viewer to consider the great unknowable mysteries of the universe. – Ayesha

 

  • Bananas are curved because they grow towards the sun.  – Victoria F