These animal gifs created using only circles are utterly hypnotic

You probably never think about it but the circle is one of the most intriguing things ever discovered.

It was responsible for the discovery of the magical irrational number pi, and has extensive uses in design and art. It's all around us and you probably never even noticed.

But one person who did was Toronto-born, Paris-based designer Dorota Pankowska who was inspired by the "simplicity of the twitter logo" which - and we did not know this - was created out of 13 circles.

Don't believe us? Take a look below.

Clever, isn't it?

Dorota decided to run with this idea and see if she could create other animals from the same concept - just 13 circles.

She writes, "I thought to myself, “Only 13 circles? I doubt most of the animals will even be recognizable…” but surprisingly, I was pretty happy with what turned out. Sometimes I was even happy before I hit 13 circles, and I would “cheat” a little by adding the remaining circles on a sharp corner to simply round it out a little, instead of being forced to change the shape of the animal. But hey. :)"

Take a look at the brilliant images below, and you can see more of her work by visiting her website.

Cat

Dog

Elephant

Fox

Frog

Giraffe

Monkey

Mouse

Owl

Rabbit

Toucan

Walrus

Whale