
Instagram has clearly proven itself to be the best platform for visual artists due to its concise, image-laden format. As a curator, it’s my research tool of choice! Here’s a starter list of artists to follow on Instagram in 2020.
What used to be longtail keyword deep dives into the 5th, 6th, and sometimes even 17th pages of Google is now a shovel in the form of a hashtag. I’ll set 30 minutes aside and just launch into Instagram to find, say, a bunch of artists in a particular city, or who work in a specific medium.
Aside from the curator tricks, the results these hashtag excavations have produced are fantastic, providing endless fuel for discovery, whether the focus is art prints, murals, oil paintings, installations, gallery shows, releases, or timely collaborations.
This list of artists to follow on Instagram could easily be much longer, but then again, now we have a fun challenge for next year.
NEW YORK CITY , USA – JULY 07, 2015: Mural art Liberty by Tristan Eaton in Little Italy. Eaton painted a massive Statue of Liberty portrait on Mulberry Street on the side of Cha Cha’s Cafe and Bar via 123RF.com
Tristan’s work has taken Instagram and the entire USA by storm over the past few years. He has various murals in NYC, including a few in Little Italy that are stunning. One mural is over a parking lot and a smaller one that has been photographed and posted a ton on Insta, outside an Italian restaurant. His style is graphic, colorful, bold, and the perfect vibrant interlude to an urban walkabout. Being an LA-guy, you’ll also find plenty of his work in DTLA as well.
2. @VHILS
VHILS is an enigma, a maker at heart who creates wild textural installations and prints that depict faces & characters, while feeling like a sneaky yet insanely involved way to work. His massive installation at Wynwood Walls in Miami for Art Basel Miami Beach 2020, was an incredible undertaking, and the prints shown inside Basel were among the standouts in a crowded fair field.
If it’s a new approach to printmaking, we’re into it! Hell, we love old techniques too! Russel Muits aka Storm Print City has been travelling the world using manhole covers as aids in relief printmaking. He rolls up to a cover, paints it, lays a canvas over it and memorializes these artful pieces of everyday life.
We featured Lizzie on the blog waaaaaaaay back in the day, before IPMM was a nonprofit! We recently reconnected with her and were reminded how classic, clean, and iconic her collage work truly is. Somehow existing between design and surrealism, her restraint is notable and quite frankly, exquisite.
5. @tubsz_illa
With an incredible hand-lettered font style, his work is script gone for a walk. It feels like you’re witnessing the lineage of cave drawings and the evolution of human communication through his murals, all at once offering ease in it’s calculated application.
This is an incredible project that proves how art is one of the most moving vehicles for conveying hidden truths. The Perception of Purity is “a collaborative project that captures genuine moments and emotions of Black families, musicians, artists, etc.” The photography featured feels like a series that should definitely be added to the IPaintMyMind Permanent Collection.
7. @nick_tez
Playing with pattern, color, depth, and our ability to see and perceive, this muralist and designer plays with space in a way that draws you in and spits you out. Labyrinthian in its essence, you’ll find your brain pretzeling as you allow your eye to follow and move via the clean lines.
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