Opinionated insights for navigating Reddit as an artist.

First things first:

Likes are not a Qualitative Metric

Let us never forget that.

If you’re an artist working within a visual medium like painting, film or sculpture, then chances are you share your work on social media.  And chances are the social media application you’re most invested in is Instagram.  

Unless, of course, you have ascended to a certain stature in the art world and have fully transcended social media altogether. Contemporary artists like George Condo, Jenny Saville, and Gerhard Richter come to mind. Lucky them.

But it’s more likely you’re not in that class of artist (It’s okay, I’m not either.) –

– and chances are if you’ve been sharing your art on Instagram you’ve felt a big D: disappointed, discouraged, disheartened, and/or disenchanted. 

Perhaps it’s not very cool to admit this, but it’s okay.

It’s okay to care. 

The cultural paradigm amongst younger generations (mine included) of maintaining ironic distance from everything is likely not to yield anything to true substance or value.  

Yes, this ironic distance is safe, comfortable and ostensibly protects you from the anxieties of failure. (because if you never try how could you fail)

But for what? Don’t tell me (deep down) you wouldn’t want your work to end up in a museum or private collection one day.  

It’s okay to care. It’s okay to aim high.

Okay, back to my initial point about –

Posting Art on Reddit.

We know the process of art making and art sharing is a vulnerable one.  To entrust your delicate little painted baby to a winner-take-all-based algorithm can be intimidating to the point of paralysis (I made a drawing to illustrate this point – its pretty apt).  

But that isn’t a solution either.  Social media is a tool, a hammer.  You can build a house with it or you can hit yourself over the head.  It’s all about how you use it.  If you are in fact “trying to make it” (as an artist) it’s unnecessary martyrdom not to wield it.

Enter: Posting your Art on Reddit. 

For some years now I have used certain subreddits to share my work, sometimes with great success.  Like real material success, not just cheap dopamine hits, yielding painting sales and acquiring commissions.

Some of the subreddits in which I have found success and encouragement sharing my work include:

• r/pleinair – a small community where people engage about plein air paintings and related topics – fun!
• r/oilpainting – a larger yet still niche community centered around – you guessed it – oil painting.
• r/painting – quite large and very generally oriented around all things paint however a very real space where traction can be achieved.
• r/art – okay, I’ll be honest, this is an extremely intimidating and competitive space – but if you can get even a little traction in this subreddit your work will be seen by many (which is the point, right?)

If you’re really thirsty for work (hey, we’ve all been there) there are other spaces specifically for soliciting your creative talents.  In my experiences these subreddits have never yielded substantial results but hopefully your experience will be different:

• r/hungryartists – might as well take out an post on craigslist, at least if you’re a painter painter
• r/commissions – lots of nsfw digital art commerce happening here
• r/artcommissions – same

There are probably more subreddits in this same vein too, these are just the ones I’m familiar with.

When it comes to sharing Art on Reddit the Nicheyer the Better

As in the more of a niche you are able to satiate the better.  For example I recently shared an oil painting of a Whataburger Bag in all the standard communities but I also shared this same painting in the r/whataburger community with some pleasantly surprising results.  I even made a connection with another oil painter here in Houston.

Needless to say this made me feel good.  It’s okay to seek encouragement and positive reinforcement in your creative practice.

So when it comes to sharing your art on reddit – get nichey and shoot your shot!

This brings me to my last point:

The Difference In Communities on Instagram and Reddit 

I’m not a sociologist, nor am I an anthropologist. I’m not any sort of ‘ologist at all.

That said, I’m not making any claims about these communities at large other than what I’ve experienced in my own narrow lane of inhabiting these spaces.

Instagram has become such a social behemoth that people are quite stingy about sharing other peoples work, commenting/engaging and just generally being at all generous with their coveted social credit pixels.

It’s true, you know it’s true.

Chances are you’re stingy too and it’s okay because I also am (Most embarrassing admission of all) .  I’m not sure if this applies to other corners of Instagram but certainly the ones dominated by painting, gallery painting, mural painting and graffiti are really nothing more than cool guy (and girl) sports.

It is what it is.  “Likes” became a very real commodity and people ain’t giving them out for free.

Reddit is not that.

At least it has not been in my experience. Maybe some communities are, but not the painting-centric ones I’ve engaged in. Reddit has a more encouraging spirit. People aren’t hording social-cache.

It’s almost like Instagram is capitalism and Reddit is socialism.  One app is a legit winner-take-all format designed to alienate while the other is a space mediated by excessive amounts of rules whilst ultimately predicated on serving a community.

It’s not a value judgement as much as it’s an observation.  I mean they don’t both steal your data anyway let’s not be too idealistic here.

The Point Is 

If you’re an artist feeling fatigued by the necessity of existing on Instagram consider sharing your art on Reddit too.  That’s all.

And never forget that regardless of the platform “Likes” – “Upvotes” – “Kudos” are not qualitative measurements of your value as an artist or a person.

If it makes you feel any better Matisse, Van Gogh and Pollock didn’t get any “likes” either – at least not initially.