Joining a community of artists can be one of the most beneficial things you can do to advance your craft. Communities are a great place to share knowledge and resources, get high-quality feedback on your work, and make friends that understand what it’s like to be an artist. Local artist communities are irreplaceable, but there are many communities online that every artist should be aware of. For the past two years I have been writing about reddit on my blog and helping clients engage various reddit communities. Reddit is typically seen as a place for video game obsessed tech nerds, but anyone that takes the time to look closer will find a substantial community of artists on the platform. The artist communities on reddit offer a wealth of information, inspiration, and opportunities to practice your craft. In this post, I help you find the communities related to your craft and highlight the communities that provide endless creative prompts.
Finding reddit communities related to your craft
There are a number of communities on reddit that are dedicated to a specific craft. For example the Pottery community on reddit has over 4,000 subscribers sharing art, techniques, news, and questions. Below is a screenshot of the first four posts in the Pottery community at the time that I wrote this post.
These four posts give a good snapshot of the type of content that is shared and discussed in this community. In addition to the Pottery community, reddit has a community for every major craft. Here is a short list of popular craft-specific communities on reddit:
If you need help finding a community on reddit related to your craft, read this post which details the process step-by-step. Joining a community dedicated to your craft can be invaluable. Each community is an opportunity to learn new things about your craft, share your work, receive feedback, ask questions, and interact with other people that love the same thing you do.
Reddit communities for drawing competitions and activities
Drawing is a fundamental skill that almost any artist can benefit from practicing on a daily basis. Reddit has multiple communities that give you fun prompts to practice and share your work with a community of artists. Here are the three largest drawing communities on reddit.
1. SketchDaily Every day a theme is posted to the SketchDaily community. Artists then reply to that post and others provide feedback on submissions. On March 31st, 2015, the theme was “Beauty and the Beastâ€. You can see the submissions in this thread.
Posted by reddit user Nakkeosten
2. ICanDrawThat Reddit users that want something drawn post their requests to the ICanDrawThat community. Artists then respond to the requests with original artwork. Here is a post where someone makes a request for a friend that recently lost a horse. See the responses in this thread.
Posted by reddit user moonshinemicky
3. RedditGetsDrawn RedditGetsDrawn is a community similar to ICanDrawThat, but much bigger and focused more on recreating pictures of reddit users. This community provides endless opportunities to practice your craft and engage in friendly competition with other reddit users. In this thread, a reddit user requests drawings of his son eating spaghetti.
Posted by reddit user Maizilla
Sharing your art on reddit
Now that you know about the various artist communities on reddit, you need to know how to properly share your art. Reddit will not accept links to your website or online store. This is because people frequently abuse reddit to promote and spam their products. Instead, you must upload pictures of your art to imgur.com. You can use imgur for free and without creating an account, but I suggest you create an account so you can delete a picture in the future if needed.
New to reddit?
Reddit can feel overwhelming and complex at first. If you need help learning how to use reddit, read our Beginners Guide to reddit. It has everything you need to know to become comfortable and confident on reddit.
We also have the Artist’s Guide to reddit Communities, which has a detailed list of reddit communities for artists. If you have any questions or thoughts about reddit, please post them in the comments and I will respond!
Author Bio David DiGiovanni is a marketing and community consultant that specializes in the reddit platform. He helps content creators of all kinds connect with their audience on reddit and writes about it at MarketersGuideToReddit.com.
I’m very new to reddit. If I post an image of my art and someone asks if I sell my art, can I then respond with a link or would they message me?
It depends on the sub reddit. Usually links are fine but some sub reddits have rules against self promotion. You can check the rules for the sub reddit or to be safe you can just reply to the comment saying “yes feel free to DM me” or “yes I will DM you” and then message them or wait for a message.