Vancouver makeup artist Mimi Choi creates amazing trompe l’oeil illusions on the faces and bodies of herself and others.
Choi explained her process to Allure’s Kristen Bateman:
“When I do illusions now, I draw my inspiration mostly from my surroundings, photography, paintings, and emotions. I try not to look at other makeup artists’s work too much and challenge myself to produce original, unique work,” she says. “My main goal each time I do a new look is to beat myself from yesterday because I’m the biggest critic and competition to myself. It’s gotten really hard to impress myself these days but it motivates me to keep trying and doing better.”
As a former school teacher, Choi has been doing makeup for three years now and uses paint brushes to achieve detail. She attended classes at Blanche Macdonald, a local beauty school to learn her craft, but really pushes things to the limits by creating makeup that’s so extreme it looks Photoshoped at first glance. Some of the looks she creates, such as one she calls “shoelace quadruple eye” (above), take up to five hours to complete.
Check out her Instagram for lots of non-lip artistry, too.
• Makeup Artist Mimi Choi Creates Mind-Blowing Optical Illusions on Herself (Allure via Bored Panda)