Rich Grilloti, “Birth of Venus” (2010) (image from killscreen.com)

Botticelli’s original “The Birth of Venus” is hanging in a soul-stirring gallery in Florence’s Uffizi Gallery, a masterpiece of delicately painted elongated figures and an icon of art history. This 8-bit version of the painting by PixelJam‘s Rich Grilloti is sitting right here on your desktop, and it’s actually also pretty awesome! Click through for some more art as video games and video games as art. [via Killscreen]

In case you need a refresher, here Sandro Botticelli’s original from 1485 for your comparison:

Sandro Botticelli, “The Birth of Venus” (1485) (image from wikipedia.org)

8-bit art is nothing new, but it’s great how delicately Grilloti handled the colors and the composition of the ethereally beautiful Botticelli painting. And forming a complex quartet of human figures and a landscape background into a grid of single blocks? Very cool. Why not take it one step further with painter Brock Davis‘s Donkey Kong (the original) as abstract expressionism?

Brock Davis’s abstract expressionist interpretation of Donkey Kong (image from geekologie.com)

Or how bout this Super Mario World as a hazy impressionist vista by Orioto? I happen to think Yoshi’s Island is a Fauvist masterpiece, myself.

Orioto’s impressionist take on Super Mario World (image from orioto.deviantart.com)

Kyle Chayka was senior editor at Hyperallergic. He is a cultural critic based in Brooklyn and has contributed to publications including ARTINFO, ARTnews, Modern Painters, LA Weekly, Kill Screen, Creators...