Although he had rarely touched a paintbrush before, Matthew
Chessco found himself reaching toward the canvas to pursue his dreams after
quitting a career in mechanical engineering only four days into the job.
اضافة اعلان
Reinventing himself through months of trial and error, he might
have taken the conventional route and tried to partner with a gallery to sell
his paintings. But when it came time for Chessco to start exhibiting, he logged
onto TikTok.
There, his neon-colored portraits of icons like Bob Ross, George
Washington and Megan Thee Stallion have garnered more than 2 million fans — a
crowd several times larger than the followings of critically acclaimed artists
like Jeff Koons and Kehinde Wiley on Instagram. Chessco’s audience clicked in
appreciation of his Warhol-inspired aesthetic and how often he choreographed
the creation of his works to music ranging from Vivaldi’s “The Four Seasons” to
the rapper 6ix9ine’s “Gooba.”
Move over, Instagram. TikTok is wooing viewers in droves. Most
galleries have shown little interest in finding their next big star there, and
critics have eschewed its surfeit of amateurish neon-pop paintings that are
more like street art. But platform creators like Chessco are building their
businesses big time, courting viewers as street artists once did on Instagram
nearly a decade ago.
“A video of my paintings went viral about a year ago; suddenly,
I had more than 350,000 views over three days,” said Chessco, 27. He opened an
online shop, becoming one of the most popular visual artists on the social
media platform.
Soon he was selling artworks for around $2,000 each, partnering
with music labels, and collaborating with advertising agencies. Those business
deals, he says, often earn him nearly $5,000 per post on the platform, which is
owned by Beijing-based company ByteDance. But success breeds competition.
Chessco recently discovered that he had a doppelgänger on TikTok
— another artist was copying his videos’ style, subjects and music, as well as
selling his paintings for a fraction of the price, alongside
prints and supplies, on a website nearly identical to the one Chessco uses.
After posting a video February 8 alerting his followers to the
existence of an imitator, Chessco discovered that the artist had blocked
comments on his page and deleted his website. But the doppelgänger soon
reopened his online store and started posting videos again a few days later. “The
competition is really fierce,” Chessco said, shaking his head.
When a minute-long video can attract fame and fortune, is it any
surprise that young artists are bypassing art schools and student loans,
quitting their survival jobs and pursuing careers as full-time artists on
TikTok? But the app’s insatiable demand for content is also bending their
aesthetics in unexpected ways. What happens when viewership plummets, copycats
encroach and fans start dictating an artist’s taste? Fortunes can suddenly
fizzle.
Despite the gold rush on TikTok, few established artists and
institutions are participants. The Uffizi Gallery in Florence, which has made
headlines for its humorous use of the medium, has seen a sizable drop in
engagement over recent months. Photographer Cindy Sherman, a prolific user of
Instagram, said through a representative that she has no interest in joining
TikTok right now, calling the platform “too gimmicky.”
But art world laurels matter little on TikTok, where an
algorithm allows users to infinitely scroll through related interests; rather,
it’s the artists tapping into “the moment” who gain clout. Success requires
artwork that can immediately catch a viewer’s attention, usually with some
combination of internet culture, human anatomy and dank memes. It’s a formula
that works well with TikTok’s leading demographic: the teenagers who make up
nearly a third of the app’s users.
And many artists on TikTok are finding it difficult to sustain
interest. While still a student, Gina D’Aloisio, a 22-year-old sculptor, posted
a video of herself creating an eerily realistic silicone face mask. It received
more than 22 million views; more followers came over when she shared other
fleshy body parts from her oeuvre, including a belly button ashtray and a foot
candle.
And some artists of color are finding that success can bring
another type of criticism that their white counterparts don’t see.
Leila Mae Thompson received more than 1 million views for a
video in which she announced her intention to adopt the confidence of male
artists. Her boldness paid off with nearly 300 new subscribers linked to her
Patreon page, where fans paid $5 per month to receive custom stickers and
updates on her work.
Thompson, a 23-year-old self-taught artist in Richmond,
Virginia, now operates a small business through TikTok selling posters and
shirts that has earned nearly $20,000 since August. Her subject matter often
involves the Black Lives Matter movement and artistic responses to the death of
George Floyd; as a result, some commenters have accused her of capitalizing on
racial injustice, not realizing that she identifies as biracial and Black.
“Race has been a difficult part of my life,” Thompson said, “and
having people make you question it again online is traumatic.”
She also recognizes a double standard on a platform where the
number of white artists who find success dwarfs the number of artists of color
who shoot to stardom. In June, TikTok apologized amid accusations of censorship
and content suppression by Black users, many of whom say they have seen their
ideas appropriated by white creators However, many in the app’s Black community
say that little has changed.
“All of my videos that have done well; my face is not showing in
them,” Thompson said.
The volatility of life on TikTok has led some artists to form
support groups. Colette Bernard, a 21-year-old sculptor at the Pratt Institute
in Brooklyn, frequently collaborates with five other users, including Thompson
and tries to persuade established artists that keeping one foot in the digital
world of TikTok and another in the professional art scene can open doors
“You can make a video of yourself talking about art while coming
fresh out of the shower with a towel on your head, which I have, and reach
thousands of people,” Bernard said. “But established artists and ancient
institutions aren’t interested in showing that level of rawness to the public.”
Since joining the platform last year, she has made more than
$45,000 through her online shop, focusing her efforts on low-priced items like
stickers, jewelry and shirts. (TikTok’s Creator Fund, the platform’s incentive
program, rewards a select number of users with a few cents per thousand views.)
“I’m going to be self-employed when I graduate,” Bernard said.
Still, she acknowledges the capricious qualities of TikTok can
leave artists in a vulnerable position. “You have to post every day or people
lose interest,” she said. “And it’s absolutely changed the type of work I
create. It’s more sustainable for me to sell shirts and stickers than the large
sculptures I make for school.”
Her anxiety levels peaked in January when, she said, a glitch on
TikTok caused two of her videos to receive zero views. She had invested more
than $20,000 in her products. “If they don’t sell, I’m screwed.”
But late last month, Bernard was upward-bound on the TikTok
roller coaster. Another of her videos had gone viral and fans had spent nearly
$10,000 in her online store in the course of the day.
