On a table at his home in Rosetta, a port city in (north) Egypt, self-taught artist Ibrahim Bilal displayed a variety of his signature mini sculptures (make) with pencil tips.
With about 80 works (feature) landmarks and famous people in Egypt and beyond, 30-year-old artist said he (inspire) four years ago to thoroughly grasp the art form after watching videos of a Chinese artist carving pencil lead(铅笔芯) into sculptures.
Fond of ancient Egyptian icons(图标), Bilal dedicated one of his earliest works to the world-famous Rosetta Stone, an ancient Egyptian relic (accidental) discovered in his city and has been kept in the British Museum.
Bilal uses a microscope for an enlarged view, a set of pen cutters or carving detail (knife), and quality pencils are mostly made in Germany or China while working. Through his hands, landmarks across the globe, including the Leaning Tower of Pisa in Italy, appear on the pencil tips. The size of each sculpture is no more 6 mm unless it is a tower. And each takes an average of 10 hours (finish).
