Don’t display your art to the world if you’re not strong enough to take criticism
This artist’s mob of a following harassed an art critic for their opinion. And so did the artist himself actually! Encouraged it even. What a bum.
For all of you guys that aren’t going to read the relatively long article, here’s a TL;DR
The artist in question is Devon Rodriguez, who you will more likely recognize if I say he is “the painter who draws people on the subway, from TikTok.”
He did a gallery, and this critic, Ben Davis, said that these types of subway portraits are nothing new. The portraits are good as far as realistic portraits go, but as an art critic, the portraits themselves are not very noteworthy. The videos of him making the portraits are what is noteworthy.
Devon Rodriguez didn’t like the review and pointed his fans at it. His fans didn’t actually read the review (nor did Devon). The fans really got stuck on the part where the critic said that you might not recognize the artist until he called him “the painter who draws people on the subway, from TikTok.”
On Saturday morning, I woke up to a tidal wave of anger from Rodriguez on Instagram, tagging me across scores of posts. Hundreds of his followers went on the attack, swarming my Instagram: “loser,” “hater,” “pathetic,” “jealous,” “your a dick,” and on and on and on. There were many creative variations on “kill yourself.” Others said they were going to get me fired, or said things like, “we are going to start a cancellation campaign against you.” A large number thought that defending Rodriguez meant calling me bald, ugly, fat, or whatever they thought could get under my skin. Most didn’t seem to have actually read my article. A contingent went after my wife. “Some women will do anything for money,” one commented. That one was funny, actually.
Meanwhile, Devon makes public posts saying, of the critic, “love will always outshine being a hater, I hope I taught you that today.”
The critic goes on to say that Devon Rodriguez’s videos are obviously faked, and posts the most obvious example he could find, where another TikToker dances on the London Underground for 30 minutes while he makes a sketch of her that clearly seems to be from a photo not taken at the time. The whole thing has multiple camera angles, and then she acts surprised when he reveals that he drew her.
He ends talking a lot about how problematic parasocial relationships can be. These are where a lot of people feel like they “know” a famous person, but he clearly doesn’t know them. And the celebrity ends up with a lot of people acting all wacky to defend him.
I wish we could hold people who do stuff like this with their social media platform accountable and make it so whoever does this kind of stuff would get deplatformed immediately or something.
It’s gross that some people think it’s genuinely okay to practically sic their fans on people who just… don’t like what they do, or might disagree with something they said. The fact the TikTok person also said “love will always outshine being a hater, I hope I taught you that today” is a fucking disgusting and twisted line of thinking because he’s encouraging his fans to hate on the critic - where’s the “love” in that?
Just assume anyone who gets popular on social media platform for regularly doing something that seems unlikely is staging it. Or just assume they all stage everything.
Then there is no need to try and expose anyone because we already know they are entertainers who stage everything.
That’s what creeps me out about those animal rescue videos on YouTube. Like, one video of finding an emaciated kitten and nursing it back to health - cool. A whole channel full of these? Where the fuck are you “finding” all these poor animals?
In the areas that never watched Price is Right, probably.
I’m sorry, but… how does that relate to what I am saying?
I was talking about how we should hold these influencers accountable for doing shit like siccing fans on critics or publicly posting the location of a critic’s house on social media after doxxing said critic. Whether their content is real or not is an entirely different conversation - I’m talking about how these social media platforms should make this kind of behavior not okay and deplatform them for basically using their fanbase and/or fame to intimidate and threaten others.
Never heard of this guy but no one should be surprised by his actions. Seems like folks popular only on social media tend to be very thin skinned and entitled.
It wasn’t even a negative review, it was constructive criticism.
Yeah, but this guy only usually gets adoring tik tok fans and puff pieces in the media. This is the first time an established art magazine reviewed his work and it obviously pissed him off that this was criticism he and his ad agency had no control over. He should just enjoy his success instead of worrying about the art establishment, because he’s a viral sensation, not a critical darling. He’ll always be a Thomas Kinkade, never a Basquiat. And there’s not really anything wrong with that.
Agreed. Now I’m going to go buy a puzzle
Huh, his art is technically fine, but I’ve seen photorealism done better (and really, it tends to be one of the most boring genres of art imo, because it’s usually more focused on accuracy than on any kind of meaning or feeling). I probably wouldn’t have thought twice about him if I ever came across his work, but now my impression is that he’s not particularly likeable in addition to being a pretty mediocre artist. Especially since the original review was very fair - maybe nicer than he deserved. That chicken hand was rough.
Article says he works with “A-list celebrities”
Open TikTok link
It’s Jared Leto
Birds of a feather stick together, him being a harasser isn’t surprising then.
Isn’t this the dude who obviously makes staged videos? In his videos there is always an obvious cut when the camera pans from the subject in the subway to the drawing. No wonder all his fans are straight up morons
What a sad life the artist must have to be so callous
He should play George Santos in the inevitable biopic/buddy comedy of one [George Santos can play George Santos I and his best friend and occasional casual friend-with-congressional-benefits, George Santos I(I)
Edit: and like the whole 47 second credit run is populated exclusively by George Santos. Where is that schtick from btw if anyone knows? Like the gag where you are all the credits…and it goes like waaay too fast low-budget style
In what world is that douche an artist?
TikTok? I hear it’s a whole world of douches.
I suppose I mean in what reality.
Virtual.
Damn this is some thin skinned baby behavior
deleted by creator
I don’t think Trump is responsible for this one
He’s just a symptom of the larger problem. But as the highest profile symptom, the lack of meaningful consequences so far does little to discourage others from following his example.
Trump publicly praised and encouraged terrorism directed at his political opponent(s)
He may not have created the problem, but he has done a lot to exacerbate it.
Exhibit two: January 6
