As someone who is studying to become a professional artist, I love "bad art" more than ever.
Ok but for real I love "bad art" so much. Sonic OCs and sparkledogs made by 13 year olds on Deviantart with MS Paint. Entire comics drawn on spare homework pages, all graphite, all used paper. Attempts at cartoons made on Powerpoint or on free/cheap video editing programs.
When I was younger I got mocked for my "bad art" and thought the only way to "repent" from my artistic sins (what nowadays is called "cringe") was to make fun in turn of others' "bad art", as if it was the curse from The Ring. It also created huge insecurities in my own artistic ability, as if it had to be "good enough" to be protected by mockery, and never showed anything again until a decade later.
It also prompted me to "get better", but there must be better ways to prompt artistic growth than through mockery. One thing my personal demon never told me, one thing I found out myself, is that there's more to art than just skill displayed. There's trying to convey what's on your mind on paper, or on screen, or on other physical materials. There's genuinity in the emotions and feelings and stories you're trying to convey. Even if that emotion is just simply "I made up a little guy in my head and I think they're very cool"
Of course, because most of this art comes from the artist's own interests and inner world and not, say, making it for money or popularity, it also means it can be incredibly niche. Specific. Self-indulgent. In other words, it means it's not art "for everybody" - it's mostly art made by its artist, for its artist. You'll find lots of "bad art" that you'll find unappealing and/or uninteresting. And that's okay! That's part of the beauty of it - the very reason this kind of art is made is because the artist wants it to exist by any means available to them - even if that means cheap, unprofessional tools. And that's where the genuinity, the passion, the "magic" comes from.
And yes, sometimes, I'll still have a laugh at "bad art". But please, understand: that laugh doesn't come from a place of mockery. I do not intend to ridicule, or make artists feel bad for something they made. I might find their art unintentionally funny because of their lack of artistic or storytelling skills stops them from truly conveying what they intended, but rest assured, it's a laugh of celebration, of enjoyment. Maybe it's not the reaction expected but it means it awakened an emotion on me: charm. That's something lots of professionally made art (those gorgeous digital paintings with the light on point, those intrincate models of realistic weapons, those films that rack up a million billion bucks on theatres all over the globe) doesn't achieve. Because it doesn't ring with me. But "bad art" did. Even if it's the funny bone. Laughing is human. Art is, above everything, human.
tangentwithtanner
romaincrisis
jacobvanloon
2087
origamiaround
titsay
dailybridgerton
turnnoffyourmind
