Pixel art
Description
Pixel art is a form of digital art drawn with graphical software where images are built using pixels as the only building block. It is widely associated with the low-resolution graphics from 8-bit and 16-bit era computers, arcade machines and video game consoles, in addition to other limited systems such as LED displays and graphing calculators, which have a limited number of pixels and colors available. The art form is still employed to this day by pixel artists and game studios, even though the technological limitations have since been surpassed. Read more ↗
Key Artists
Tomohiro Nishikado
Designer and programmer of Space Invaders (1978), whose iconic alien sprites became foundational symbols of pixel art and video game culture.
Shigeru Miyamoto
Nintendo's first staff artist and legendary game designer who created the pixel-based characters Mario and Link, defining the visual language of 8-bit and 16-bit gaming.
Toru Iwatani
Creator of Pac-Man (1980), one of the most recognizable pixel art characters ever created, proving that simple pixel designs could anchor global cultural franchises.
eBoy
Berlin-based art collective known as the 'Godfathers of Pixel Art'; created intricate isometric cityscapes ('pixoramas') that brought pixel art into galleries and commercial design.
Paul Robertson
Australian animator known for hyper-detailed, psychedelic pixel art animations; contributed pixel graphics to Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: The Game.
Susan Kare
Graphic designer who created the original Macintosh icon set (1984) using a 32×32 pixel grid, establishing the visual language of modern computer interfaces.
Adele Goldberg
Computer scientist at Xerox PARC who, along with Robert Flegal, coined the term 'pixel art' in a 1982 ACM journal paper.
Famous Artworks
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Fun Facts
The term 'pixel art' was coined in a 1982 paper by Adele Goldberg and Robert Flegal of Xerox PARC, published in the ACM SIGGRAPH journal, originally describing any art created at the pixel level.
↗ Source: en.wikipedia.org
Shigeru Miyamoto gave Mario a mustache, cap, and overalls not for aesthetic reasons but because of pixel limitations - the mustache eliminated the need to draw a mouth, the cap avoided animating hair, and the overalls made arm movements visible against the body.
↗ Source: en.wikipedia.org
Susan Kare drew inspiration from needlepoint, mosaic art, and international symbol signage to create the original Macintosh icons on graph paper before transferring them to the computer's 32×32 pixel grid.
↗ Source: moma.org