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# Everything Old Is New Again: GIFs Edition
- URL: https://hyperallergic.com/everything-old-is-new-again-gifs-edition/
- Published: 2013-10-25T19:37:04.000Z
- Updated: 2025-11-24T16:44:56.000Z
- Description: Wow, digital art man, it's so fresh, like short moving pictures in the Graphics Interchange Format and cyber-self-portraits and the printer that will make a flimsy thing out of plastic just like that.
- Author: Mostafa Heddaya
- Tags: Opinion, net art, #wp, #wp-post, #image-position-hidden, #Import 2025-11-24 06:59 (2012, 2013, part 2)

![tumblr_mprm92sRFC1r9jbwno1_500](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2013/10/tumblr_mprm92srfc1r9jbwno1_500.gif)

A 19th century phenakistoscope disc (image via Dick Balzer on Tumblr)

Wow, digital art man, it’s so fresh, like short moving pictures in the [Graphics Interchange Format](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphics%5FInterchange%5FFormat?ref=hyperallergic.com) and [cyber-self-portraits](https://twitter.com/klausbiesenbach/status/392220706429075456?ref=hyperallergic.com) and the printer that will make a flimsy thing out of plastic *just like that*. New media, as we well know, is a bottomless cornucopia of originality — a [recent auction](https://hyperallergic.com/auction-trolls/) of some such computer things on Park Avenue proved it.

But wait — net artisans The Verge recently [uncovered evidence](http://www.theverge.com/2013/10/25/5027890/the-psychedelic-and-grotesque-proto-gifs-of-the-19th-century?ref=hyperallergic.com) that nearly two hundred years ago, 19th-century trolls were looping images for naught but the #LOLs. Verge calls them proto-GIFs (what about neo–flip books?), but their actual name is phenakistoscope discs, and you can read about them on [Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phenakistoscope?ref=hyperallergic.com). Talk about putting the Trecartin before the [horse](https://hyperallergic.com/from-weird-twitter-to-mundane-conceptualism-the-horse%5Febooks-story/)!

Here are some phenakistoscopes, animated as GIFs, via [Dick Balzer on Tumblr](http://dickbalzer.tumblr.com/?ref=hyperallergic.com):

![tumblr_mq96r5W3Gb1r9jbwno1_500](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2013/10/tumblr_mq96r5w3gb1r9jbwno1_500.gif)

![tumblr_mqta6fNNHr1r9jbwno1_500](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2013/10/tumblr_mqta6fnnhr1r9jbwno1_500.gif)

![tumblr_mr6c5hCEjG1r9jbwno1_500](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2013/10/tumblr_mr6c5hcejg1r9jbwno1_500.gif)

![tumblr_mrcplcnsSa1r9jbwno1_500](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2013/10/tumblr_mrcplcnssa1r9jbwno1_500.gif)

![tumblr_mrnte4vntX1r9jbwno1_500](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2013/10/tumblr_mrnte4vntx1r9jbwno1_500.gif)

![tumblr_mrzz3mkuzR1r9jbwno1_500](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2013/10/tumblr_mrzz3mkuzr1r9jbwno1_500.gif)

![tumblr_muty4r1JKX1r9jbwno1_500](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2013/10/tumblr_muty4r1jkx1r9jbwno1_500.gif)

![tumblr_muty3oaGDv1r9jbwno1_500](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2013/10/tumblr_muty3oagdv1r9jbwno1_500.gif)

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