What are your art icks?

[chocovelvetcake]

What are some things about the art community (or art in general) that annoy you? I'll go first:


- People who accuse others of stealing other artists' art styles.

How the hell can you steal an art style? Since when did art styles get copyrighted? It's not like your favorite artists are gonna file a lawsuit against you for "stealing their art style." Art style theft doesn't even exist. Nobody's art style is 100% original anyways, and there's bound to be similarities between your art style and someone else's.


- People who bully amateur/beginner artists.

I see this a lot on TikTok, but this can happen on pretty much any social media: Twitter, Instagram, DeviantArt, you name it. People make fun of amateur/beginner level artists because they "can't draw good." There was this one artist on TikTok who got bullied for their rendering process video, and people started to bully them. No artist comes out of their mother's womb drawing Mona Lisa quality type artwork. Every artist starts off not knowing how to draw anything.


- Artists who trace/steal from other artists.

While tracing isn't inherently a bad thing, taking somebody's artwork, tracing it, posting it and claiming it as yours is considered stealing. Even if you didn't outright trace from the artist's work, just simply taking it from their gallery, posting it, and claiming that you drew it is wrong.


- When artists receive unsolicited/destructive criticism.

Constructive criticism can be very helpful to artists. However, when someone gives an artists criticism if they didn't even ask for it, it can come off as rude. The same goes for destructive criticism. Telling an artist that their art sucks does NOT qualify as constructive criticism.

- When a younger artist draws better than you.
Whenever I see an artists who's younger than me draw way better than me, I can't help but to feel defeated. I would scroll through some artist's gallery and read their bio, only to find out that they're a few years younger than me.

- Trying to study other artists' work, only to end up getting demotivated because you feel like you'll never be as good as them.
Whenever I'm struggling to draw something, I would look up an artist whose work I like and use their art as a reference, only to get demotivated and feel like shit because they draw so much better than me and I'm not even at their level yet.

 

[DawningWinds]

Moderator notice:
While we understand that everyone has their own opinions and tastes, please be respectful in expressing them, especially should the conversation in this thread turn towards focusing on the art itself, rather than community issues, and while discussing community issues, please avoid bashing any individuals. This thread's topic is one that could cross into many touchy subjects, so this is basically a general "be nice" in case.

 

[sleepwick]

for me my biggest one is also people bashing not even just beginner artists but in general artists regardless of skill if certain things in their art look awkward.

another one is i cant stand it when an artist gets called out for being a bad person and everyone jumps to be like "their art sucked anyway" or jump to trace or steal that persons art. bc most of the time the people doing this weren't affected by the artist in questions actions, and it just feels very disrespectful and insensitive to the people who were infact harmed by the artists actions to disregard any actual conversation of what they did wrong in favor of bashing their art.

 

[c la fet]

When an artist deletes their work

 

[toastghost]

When an artist deletes their work

i have a bad habit of doing that all the time sorry

anyway, i think my least favorite thing about the art community now is the use of ai art. most ai art generators straight up steal art from creators and use it for their algorithm, which is pretty awful. and i don't even classify ai art as art. art needs to be made by human hands and evoke some emotion from the people viewing it. to me, ai art is neither. it's a robot making something that's technically good, but essentially soulless. and thousands of artists pour their heart and soul into the work, and seeing painfully generic ai art getting all the attention can be really disheartening.

 

[Teebs96]

not to police other people's arts, but i do get a little side-eye-ing these days if people draw canonically thicker characters (melony, gordie, wulfric) thinner than they're canonically depicted, and of course darker skinned characters as lighter skinned than they should be

this isn't exclusive to pokemon art though, obviously.

 

[R.O.B.]

"fixed it for you!" makes it look even worse than before

 

[Dreary_Rowlet]

Using certain pieces of art without permission, ugh oh god.

 

[escolopendror]

The concept of beginner art/certain prompts of art (like ship art, drawing your characters) being "cringe".
Any kind of gatekeeping when it comes to art in general! Let people draw their ships and their ocs! If they're not drawing harmful things and they're having fun, who cares if it's cringe or not?
And when it comes to beginner art, making fun of people for drawing what they love just because their drawings are "not good enough" is disgusting imo. I have so many feelings about this but I hope I expressed myself the way I intended to haha.

 

[QuietDragon]

I love ship art. ;_;

[CW unhealthy relationships, implications of CSA]

Even if the ship's unhealthy in a modern/real world context, as long as it's all appropriately warned for, kept out of children's spaces/marked as mature content [since kids' media does tend to be moralizing and hold the viewers' hand and show them right from wrong because the creators want it to have some educational value, whereas adult content expects a reader to be able to tell on their own instead of having to have the text explain real world morals for them, can depict unhealthy relationships, or be written from the perspective of a criminal rationalizing his crimes*], and it's all fantasy anyway, it shouldn't be a problem!

The only things that bug me much in art is stuff I know originated in eroge/erotic games but seeped out into the mainstream, so a lot of artists incorporate it into their style unaware of that, but if you know its origins and if it becomes clear the art's fetishistic, it skeeves me out, like those shiny (like it's all sweaty or slicked in oil) reddish/pink knees/shoulders and heavy blushes. Skeeeeves me out, hated it leaking into Pokemon in XY's run. Brrr... it's unfortunately common everywhere now, with likely a bunch of people forgetting entirely its origins.

(*Like the infamous Lolita, even with the unreliable narrator making it sound like a love story, there are still tells that convey it was abuse and even he was aware of the trauma he was inflicting, at times, like him mentioning hearing Dolores crying at night when he pretends to be asleep or the passage “what I heard was but the melody of children at play, nothing but that, and so limpid was the air that within this vapor of blended voices, (...) then I knew that the hopelessly poignant thing was not Lolita’s absence from my side, but the absence of her voice from that concord." Buuut the tricky thing about such stories is you'll get a lot of folks missing the point and just fetishizing the victim and relationship anyway, contrary to authorial intent, given the author was working through his own abuse in writing that... that's very common for abuse victims, but yeah, that's the sort of reason why I think stuff like that would be best be implied and not portrayed in detail...)

 

[impervious_gakko42]

Art of ships involving an underaged character are gross in general but even worse when it's lewded or just straight up erotic. (What's even worse is when like 80% are like "so cute!" or "love this ship!", while people saying that it's nasty are in the minority, but that's beside the point.)

I don't think all tracing is bad, as it's kept to oneself and not posted publicly. I used to trace those blank character templates when I was learning anatomy, and still do sometimes when I want to model an outfit digitally but don't feel like drawing an entire new pose. It can be a good practice tool, though if a traced work is posted publicly without credit/the og artist's permission (and especially if it's for profit) then that's just stealing with extra steps.

"Fixed" art. Yeah this doesn't really need explanation. It's usually used to either shame an artist for their stylistic decisions or belittle inexperienced artists who can't draw that well.

 

[Blanc]

for me my biggest one is also people bashing not even just beginner artists but in general artists regardless of skill if certain things in their art look awkward.

another one is i cant stand it when an artist gets called out for being a bad person and everyone jumps to be like "their art sucked anyway" or jump to trace or steal that persons art. bc most of the time the people doing this weren't affected by the artist in questions actions, and it just feels very disrespectful and insensitive to the people who were infact harmed by the artists actions to disregard any actual conversation of what they did wrong in favor of bashing their art.

Massive agree on this one, I think people tend to lose sight of the fact that this is just devolving into bullying, but they feel it is fine because the person was ‘bad’ or ‘wrong’ anyway. It’s pretty messed up.

When an artist deletes their work

I can completely understand this feel, especially if I’m looking at old art I love from an artist I’ve admired. But, I can understand why it’s something artists do, as an artist who deletes her work from the public eye myself. Still very tragic if I lose out on a piece I love, especially since I don’t often save art I like, just the pages.

Gonna throw a curveball here and mention I really don’t like the concept of “closed species” as a whole in artist spaces. I completely get how these are often a net positive for commissions and profit for artists, but the whole idea behind them tends to feel so gating and designs more often than not are not appreciated and just bought for flex or trade fodder for other designs. Capitalism versus the death of open ideas, I guess.

 

[QuietDragon]

Art of ships involving an underaged character are gross in general but even worse when it's lewded or just straight up erotic. (What's even worse is when like 80% are like "so cute!" or "love this ship!", while people saying that it's nasty are in the minority, but that's beside the point.)

Ships with underage characters aren't inherently gross, though, not every ship has any sexual element at all. The anime has plenty of hints for Pokeshipping and Contestshipping, for example, and those are innocent and sweet. Not everyone who ships something is thinking about sexual things, they could just love the idea of innocent puppy love or even have fun imagining them officially as a couple as adults too, like those folks who come up with fankids and next gen stuff too. If you find ships with kid characters gross when it isn't lewd, that's really on you because the artist and the fans calling it cute aren't remotely picturing anything you are.

Even some adults can experience romantic love without any sexual element at all. Asexual people exist.

The eroticized stuff is definitely weird, but it's likely a lot of the fans replying don't notice those elements at all (like the fanservice in XY, especially the infamous sick Ash episode which has those eroge shiny glowy shoulders and misleading scenes on purpose........) because it IS a fandom of mostly children. So, that's creepy in a whole different way...

 

[impervious_gakko42]

Ships with underage characters aren't inherently gross, though, not every ship has any sexual element at all. The anime has plenty of hints for Pokeshipping and Contestshipping, for example, and those are innocent and sweet. Not everyone who ships something is thinking about sexual things, they could just love the idea of innocent puppy love or even have fun imagining them officially as a couple as adults too, like those folks who come up with fankids and next gen stuff too. If you find ships with kid characters gross when it isn't lewd, that's really on you because the artist and the fans calling it cute aren't remotely picturing anything you are.

Even some adults can experience romantic love without any sexual element at all. Asexual people exist.

The eroticized stuff is definitely weird, but it's likely a lot of the fans replying don't notice those elements at all (like the fanservice in XY, especially the infamous sick Ash episode which has those eroge shiny glowy shoulders and misleading scenes on purpose........) because it IS a fandom of mostly children. So, that's creepy in a whole different way...

Oh, yeah, sorry I didn't make that distinction! I meant like ships involving an adult and an underage character. In addition, I'm not really talking about ones where the characters are just kinda hanging, I mean the underage x adult ones that imply romance or worse. I should've been clearer haha.

 

[Dreary_Rowlet]

I meant like ships involving an adult and an underage character

Now that, that is disgusting. No reason can justify this, it's disgusting through and through.

 

[Catz]

Bit of a personal one, but I am one who enjoys slightly thicker characters, more to love and stuff and all that jazz. So I get a little annoyed when assholes have the nerve to fat shame the art or discriminate it becuase the character is a little bigger than normal. So what? Just leave the art be without discrimination, and move on with your life without creating unnecessary drama??

 

[Lyndis]

Honestly, my biggest peeve is how massively underappreciated art is in our general lives.

Almost every second of every day we are surrounded by art. The clothes/fashion someone puts on at the beginning of their day, the music in the car/bus ride during their commute, the packaging, ads, and signage of the stores where they do their shopping, the shows and video games they mindlessly click through when they get home. Every last thing was designed by someone. Some with deep intent and passion like the media they consume, or simply designing functional and aesthetically appealing features of otherwise non-artistic things like the model of car they drive or the building they go to school in.

Yet it's very rarely ever seen as more than a hobby unless you're one of the handful working at the top of the field like Disney or AAA game studios. Working in the creative industry for even a short time provided a deluge of people who "couldn't even draw a stick figure" but then balk at the concept of paying you fairly (or at all) for your time and skill.

 

[mastermind lissi]

This has never happened to me, but when I see people on the internet get shamed for not drawing certain types of people (like, some people don’t draw black characters very often or thicker characters, or me personally, I don’t exactly like drawing adult men, just cause I’m a younger girl and they have features I don’t exactly like drawing) and people saying “all you draw are skinny white characters you’re being racist and whatever”. Like, ok, but do you draw any of those characters? Maybe people haven’t studied black or thicker people anatomy yet and are more comfortable drawing those characters, or are in a fandom where the characters look like that? Sorry if I’m putting this weirdly or any of this comes off badly, but I don’t like when people start issues from things taht don’t need to be. Just let people draw and be in peace

 

[Viridian Beedrill]

This has never happened to me, but when I see people on the internet get shamed for not drawing certain types of people (like, some people don’t draw black characters very often or thicker characters, or me personally, I don’t exactly like drawing adult men, just cause I’m a younger girl and they have features I don’t exactly like drawing) and people saying “all you draw are skinny white characters you’re being racist and whatever”. Like, ok, but do you draw any of those characters? Maybe people haven’t studied black or thicker people anatomy yet and are more comfortable drawing those characters, or are in a fandom where the characters look like that? Sorry if I’m putting this weirdly or any of this comes off badly, but I don’t like when people start issues from things taht don’t need to be. Just let people draw and be in peace

I feel this. There's some demographics that can be a "darned if you do, darned if you don't" situation. Darned if you do, because any variance from realistic anatomy (whether from art stylization or just being in the process of learning) can be taken as an offensive caricature. Darned if you don't, because, as you said, artists can get shamed for not drawing people in those demographics. There are times when things need to be called out, of course, but there's also times when the internet just likes yelling at people for no good reason.

 

[Lyndis]

I think it's a dual-edged thing.

If you're drawing for yourself as a time-waster? Who cares. Draw whatever you have fun doing, simple as. However if you're creating as an actual artist dedicated to your craft or as a professional, then there's an expectation that you should be constantly experimenting and improving to hone your skill. The only way someone improves is by constantly challenging themselves. And the only way to challenge yourself is by leaving your comfort zone. If you only ever draw the same things not only will you stagnate, but you'll eventually deteriorate. I've watched it happen to artists I used to enjoy as well as myself before when I fell out of passion for it.

Personally, I'm multi-ethnic and came up in a highly diverse family and friend group including race/nationality, body type, gender, etc. So it was always important to me that I learned how to represent those folks cause all the stories I write/illustrate reflect that part of my life. Not everyone has that same experience. So while I don't think it's a malicious thing if an artist only draws a certain type of people ( like only skinny folk, for example ) it does get me speculating on why that might be the case.