"Pin Art is, of course, a classic desk toy, but did you know it's also based on an Exploratorium exhibit? Ward Fleming developed the pinscreen while an artist in residence in 1980. It's a very real way to bring the Exploratorium into your own home." - Ryan.

In 1980, Ward Fleming received a National Endowment for the Arts grant as Artist-in-Residence at the Exploratorium in San Francisco. He developed a pinscreen table display, an interactive exhibit that allowed visitors to create forms and images in the pinscreen by running their hands across the hanging pins. Fleming then developed a funnel pinscreen whose complex patterns were formed by vibrations, a design which he then incorporated back into the pinscreen table designs. Fleming then installed several such pin-tables in science and children's museums

Would you push your hand into hundreds of straight pins...for art? It won't hurt, we promise! Make fleeting 3D impressions in this shimmering field of pinheads set in a durable metal frame—this Pin Art set is a classic, endlessly entertaining (and strangely soothing) tool for art and play.