Made from spools of thread, pipe cleaners, tacks, pen caps, and other mundane objects, Devorah Sperber’s barely recognizable, pixelated, abstracted reproductions of Old Master paintings transform into exacting versions of the originals when viewed through optical devices like acrylic spheres or convex mirrors.

In deconstructing familiar images, Sperber encourages viewers to reflect on the discrepancy between what we actually see and how our brains process it. Consequently, she follows in the centuries-long tradition of exploring the processes of perception, a lineage including Leonardo da Vinci, Georges Seurat and the Pointilists, and Salvador Dalí, among countless others.

The Museum of Contemporary Craft, which has exhibited Sperber’s work, has described her practice as simultaneously conceptual, technical, and accessible.