Studio notes: I printed this out at 16 x 21 inches on 100% rag paper (full bleed, i.e., no border). The hard edges and solid colors of the curving pixel art lines give the printed image a certain "pop," as an object hanging on a wall, owing to the contrast between those sharply defined areas and the softer, photographic parts. It feels complete to me, not needing additional cutting or collaging. Possibly because so many of the texture decisions are worked out on the screen, and the printer is reproducing them faithfully.
Conceptually was probably influenced by Reneabythe's photo-comparison Cecily Brown vs Garbage Pix. Yes, there's a bit of "my kid could do that" sneering in those pairings but Cecily Brown kind of deserves it (her earliest work looked like copulating rabbit entrails but I'm not sure what it's supposed to be now -- bee yoo tee ful painting?). The art and technology website Rhizome.org is having a panel this week on "digital painting" (props to andrej and mirrrroring) but two topics they probably won't be discussing are (i) Cecily Brown vs Garbage (could this be the "new abstraction" they are talking about?) and (ii) Artists Who Have Finally Said F.U. to Apple and Windows and Are Switching to Linux. Those would be my salon des refusés topics.