Phil Paints Pixels

Artisan oil paintings of iconic video game art and others.



Paint­ings

A selection of my latest paintings.

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Miniatures

Paintings with small dimensions

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Phil Strahl

Phil Strahl is a con­tem­porary artist, as old as the Fami­com and equally into pixels. He attended the HTL Ort­wein­schule for Arts and Design in Graz and holds a Master’s degree in arts & design from the Salz­burg Uni­ver­si­ty of Ap­plied Sci­ences. When he is not painting pixels, he is more than likely to be other­wise con­cerned with them. Phil works and lives in Salz­burg, Aus­tria.

In­spi­ra­tion

As clearly obvious, a strong in­spi­ra­tion are the iconic in­game graphics of the early home console games, espe­cial­ly those of the Fami­com/NES and Super NES. But also PC games are of in­ter­est as long as the crea­tors treated their pixels with re­spect.
Gaming aside also the in­fluence of tradi­tional and con­tem­porary visual art, space and the Aus­trian land­scape can be found hidden my work.



Creation

When painting after a template from a video game, I personally play the game in question on one of my original consoles (or in some cases on an emulator) and record my playing experience in order to select a perfect still.

I paint with Schmincke and Daler-Rowny brand oil colors on primed canvases. The size of the pixel varies but lies usually within 2 and 10 millimeters (0.08–0.30 inches). Any smaller and I would lose the gestalt of the pixels due to human inabilities to paint defined straight edges at such a size.

As reference I either print out the still on standard inkjet photo paper or work entirely from the screen on my desk while listening to podcasts, lectures or chiptunes.

Depending on the size of the canvas and the rendered pixels, a single painting takes approximately four to fifty hours of active work from inception to finish, sometimes more, not counting the time it takes each layer to dry due to the nature of oil colors, which can take several days or even weeks before it is possible to continue working.

► Find time lapses of my paintings on YouTube.



How to buy

If you want to own a painting that hasn’t been indicated as sold, please  with the painting’s name and your postal address for shipping. I will get back to you quickly regarding the shipping costs and further inquiries, if necessary. Of course you are also welcome to view and/or pick up the painting in person.

Commissions

If there’s a painting that you would love to own but I didn’t paint yet, please feel free to  regarding commissioning a piece. I am sure, together we can work out a scene that’s to your liking.



Contact

If you just want to say hi or get otherwise in contact with me, either message me on social media or write me .