Squint and you can see familiar shapes behind the dazzling detail and metallic gold of these 3D-printed chairs, but up close: finer geometries dominate each design.

Developed by John Briscella, this series of seats illustrates how metal printing can optimize for materiality (by leaving calculated voids), against a backdrop of classic furniture forms (and in some cases: set upon more traditional chair leg formations).

But it also highlights the rich array of aesthetic possibilities offered by such an approach, when one, for instance, introduces algorithms and other new technologies to inform geometric expressions.

More about the individual chairs in the series: ‘Nuum’ takes the classical form and progresses toward something new; in an homage to eames, briscella adds the mathematical letter ’n’ — a non negative integer. ‘Geofrei’ is geometrical and free. ‘Seafoam’ is calming — the entire collection is one flush with history — past, present, and a 3D printed, highly optimized future.”

Some great institutions are becoming even greater in the digital age — places like museums continue to scan high-quality paintings and photographs for distribution and agencies like NASA put vintage pictures and video footage online for everyone to access.

Joining the cool kids’ club, the Minneapolis College of Art and Design (MCAD) has taken its Art of the Poster collection from the Golden Age of graphic design (late 1800s through the early 1900s) and put it up on the web for anyone to share.

“Featuring over 200 printed works, Art of the Poster 1880-1918 presents a look at lithography’s rise in popularity during La Belle Époque,” reports MyModernMet. “It was during this time that artists like Alphonse Mucha, Jules Chéret, and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec popularized the art form, which gained public prominence thanks to new methods of production.”

In the late nineteenth century, lithographers began to use mass-produced zinc plates rather than stones in their printing process. This innovation allowed them to prepare multiple plates, each with a different color ink, and to print these with close registration on the same sheet of paper. Posters in a range of colors and variety of sizes could now be produced quickly, at modest cost.

At the time, many of these masterpieces were essentially commercial in nature, designed to promote products, stores and restaurants. Today, they have made their way into the archives of art history, helping to bridge the gap between popular culture and the closed-door art world of museum exhibits.

Gods, angels, cherubs and human mortals from famous historical artworks can be found browsing the beverage display at the corner store, passed out in front of the liquor shop, or riding the bus with an aptly bored expression in these clever remixes.

In his ongoing series Art History in Contemporary Life, Ukrainian artist Alexey Kondakov continues to document a fictional world in which ancient figures find themselves transplanted into modern cityscapes.

Among his hacks: Cesar van Everdingen’s Bacchus, Caravaggio’s David and Goliath and William-Adolphe Bouguereau’s Nymphs and Satyr, all hacked to fit into new times and places.

The scenes are so expertly edited it is left to the figures themselves to stand out from each setting through their actions or attire. Madonna, child and lamb are, for instance, a bit of a strange find in an old apartment staircase and cherubs generally aren’t seen on the Earthly plane, at least by ordinary people.

Masterpieces from Greek antiquity through the nineteenth century are literally seen through a modern lens, remade into action figures or inserted into contemporary settings, in this collection of remixed classic art.From auto mechanics styled and posed like Caravaggio subjects to storm troopers as Flemish upperclassmen, these projects bring centuries-old aesthetics into the 21st century.

Auto Mechanics in Renaissance-Style Portraits by Freddy Fabris

Inspiration struck when photographer Freddy Fabris accompanied a friend into a cluttered auto shop, the mechanics and their tools seeming like the perfect subjects for Rembrandt and Renaissance-style portraits. The award-winning series mimics such masterpieces as Leonardo da Vinci’s Last Supper and Michelangelo’s The Creation of Adam.

Classic Statue Action Figures

David, The Thinker and Venus de Milo come to life in the form of posable action figures so you can see these classic statues like you’ve never seen them before. The pre-sale for most of these figures has already ended, but ‘David’ is still available for roughly $40.

Classic Art Figures in Contemporary Settings

Angels and other subjects from classic paintings hang out in dive bars, subways and alleys in Alexey Kondakov’s series ‘Art History in Contemporary Life,’ including Hans Holbein’s ‘The Ambassadors’ and the otherworldly female figures of Bougereau.

Lego Tribute to Classic Art

Iconic works by Magritte, Vermeer and Van Eyck get the Lego treatment in a fun photographic series by Marco Pece.

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Classic Art In A Modern World 35 Masterpieces Reimagined

Shuffling through ancient paint chips, dead leaves and empty bottles in an abandoned and dilapidated building, you turn a corner and register a human figure emerging from the darkness in a haze of flesh tones and pale fabric. It might take a moment to realize that it’s not a real person, but rather a painting in the style of the old masters, rendered right there on the gritty wall like an heirloom left behind when the place was vacated.

Working under an assumed name, Belfast artist Ted Pim has spent the last ten years traveling the world, creating these eerie works inside abandoned buildings. He spends days alone completing each work armed with no more than his paints, industrial torches and a camera.

Aside from anyone who might have stumbled upon them unknowingly, no one has seen these works prior to Pim publishing the photos on his website and on Instagram in June 2015. The artist documented each painting and kept the images in a folder all these years. Private collectors in London and New York City recently purchased all of his completed works on canvas, and more are coming in winter 2015.

“I was drawn to abandoned buildings as I liked the contrast of painting detailed, Baroque-inspired pieces inside dark, neglected structures,” Pim tells WebUrbanist. “These buildings provided me with the perfect atmosphere to create my pieces, with the end result often reflecting my surroundings- haunting, dark figures.”

“The paintings usually take a few days, and I never return to the building. All my images were taken on an old analog camera and printed and scanned (the reason for fingerprints on some of the images.)”