On Unknown Artists

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namenotrequired's avatar
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This article was originally inspired by a discussion with Alavesa and posted in a journal here but people told me I should make it a news article=P So here's a revised (hopefully improved) version. Any updates and additions will be posted there.





Tip for unknown artists


First, this is something I find many just don't realise... Did you know that you're way more likely to meet new friends and getting your work noticed if you interact with unknown artists, instead of only watching already popular ones? Unknown artists will appreciate any feedback you leave them a lot more (be it a critique, a fave etc.), and often will keep talking to you and return the favour, while to many popular artists, you may be just another drop in the sea.:D
Remember, the amounts of exposure you get doesn't just depend on the quality of your work – you'll have to get some people to look in the first place! :dummy:





Where to find them


So, if you feel like being the first to discover great art, where do find them? :eager: Well, you can use the random deviant or random deviation button, use discovery (hint: every time you load the page, you get 9 popular artists and 3 unknown ones... you can see their watcher count without having to leave the page so seek out those with few watchers!), lurk the Thumbshare forum or the :#ThumbsShare: chatroom, follow some :devgroups:, or – and this may be easiest – just set the front page - www - to 'newest' instead of 'popular' :D

Other places to find art include today, channels, the portals such as literature and photography, critiquables, News Feature Articles and journal features, and collections.




How to help them


What do you do when you find an unknown artist? Well, there is of course DDs, and DailyLitDeviations for literature (besides normal lit DDs), that you can suggest them for – but there's also some initiatives that focus on unknown talent specifically.

More you can do to help them;

  • Suggest them to helping-the-unknown - if chosen will get their own news feature from one of the (usually more known) admins! (they also have a chat event coming up, see: helping-the-unknown.deviantart… )
  • Suggest them to 3wyl for her Make a Difference series: 3wyl.deviantart.com/journal/23… which features 3 different artists in an article every week.
  • If a deviation has received 0-5 comments (not counting replies), send it to ProjectComment to be featured in a weekly article (example: news.deviantart.com/article/14… )
  • Christianonfire7 has a weekly feature and likes to feature unknown artists too – note her with your suggestions.
  • hiddendelights has a series called deviants discovered focussing on underappreciated artists, for which she takes suggestions too.
  • Or... maybe you could feature them yourself? :dummy: As a premium member, you can for example feature them in custom boxes (like phoenixleo does on his page!) or journals (like Christianonfire7 and petrova and many many others do)... if you don't have a premium membership, you can feature them by displaying your 'faves' widget on your page, and you can feature them in news articles too (see the guide to dA news :D I also recommend you check out NonPremiumStyle :eager:
  • At least as useful, comment on their work. Tell them what you like about it, maybe even critique if you can! Many are on dA to improve as artist, but don't usually get constructive feedback and will be happy to receive some.






That's just my tips, if you have more ideas comment below! :hug:


I hope it helps :peace:

namenotrequired
© 2011 - 2024 namenotrequired
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Haruka-rugi's avatar
DA really need to do something to make unknowm artist more easy to find. i mean, helping us seing popular stuff is good since they're popular for good reason and make awesome art, but useless. useless because since theses artists are popular, you eventually get to see their art in less than a week even without trying. 
i fav this journal