Art is an evolving indication that a society has strongly developed itself, adding meaning and creativity to life. By connecting creators and dictating artist’s visibility by relying on an algorithm, social media has had one of the most substantial impacts on a broader community—bringing an abundance of harm and benefits to people. Unfo
Urtunately, while there is exceptional value for artists, like connections and recognition, social platforms create harm for their well-being, especially with recent changes.
Social media, particularly Instagram, an image-based platform, has brought numerous opportunities to creators with the increased connections available to artists. According to “The Benefits of Social Media for Artists” by The Evolve Artist—a program to teach art—describes the multitude of advantages for using social platforms, including the ability to market for free, developing an audience, being able to find connections and being able to find sources of inspiration. This continuously motivates the transition towards advertising art on social media.
Being able to share one’s work on a global scale is inherently useful for people’s self-esteem and the ability to find connections with employers has boosted careers more than ever before. However, these apps are becoming more unstable for.
Though with the benefits, come a multitude of harms. Including the internal pressure to get as many likes and comments as possible, the issue of comparison with other artists, and the heavy exposure to negativity has become more apparent in the last two decades. According to“How Social Media is Impacting Artists” written by Vicki Fox, as of now, “creating is not enough.” Creativity and personal well-being is hurt, as the amount of likes and comments can sustainably harm artists. Self-worth has been defined by the amount of attention received which then shapes creativity and motivation into a tool that can diminish the value of creating.
Recent updates to algorithms, especially Instagram, have begun a forest fire of criticism. The first issue that these changes have brought is the push for reels—15 to 90 second videos users can create and post—on Instagram. The new feature devalues photos and decreases the reach for artists and instead places that pressure on artists creating videos.
According to “Instagram changed, but the artists using it didn’t” written by Leah Collins—a writer for The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation—shares a story of Jenn Woodall, a popular online artist, feeling burnt out due to social media. Woodall believes that it is crucial to make reels to receive any form of engagement because of the updates to the algorithm that deprioritizes posts. Especially for those that create illustrations, rather than making videos, it can take away from the process of what is meant to be created. She feels that artists “get punished by being made invisible by the algorithm.” Instagram implemented this change in hopes of becoming a competitor with TikTok at the expense of creators.
Instagram explains another update, creating more issues on the platform with the forms of hashtags, which allows users to sort their posts into categories. They have the option to “filter the page between all top posts or top posts that were shared recently.” While, to the untrained eye, getting rid of the ‘Most Recent’ filter to hashtags may seem like not a big deal, it has strong implications for visibility. Not only are these two hashtags eerily alike but small creators who are not top in their field are much less likely to have their content be seen by their audience. This impacts them negatively because the popular creators are guaranteed to stay at the top, while smaller creators will have a more difficult time finding an audience.
Lastly, the social media platform has the ability to “shadow ban” posts and creators, meaning that creators posts are not shown to those that do not follow them. This significantly decreases their reach, exacerbating these impacts.
These features could not only worsen an artist’s mental health, but it affects the flow of income. As Advisorpedia, a digital media production company focused on finance explains in “How Instagram Algorithm is Hurting Businesses and Ways to Beat It?”, it has had an unfair impact on businesses. Less reach means businesses, especially independent artists, find less work and clients, as “users on Instagram are not seeing their posts regularly.” Income and therefore stability, is significantly harmed in the process of these updates on social media.
As more young artists emerge in the world of social media, these detrimental impacts could keep them from promoting their art works. Others are finding alternatives to these platforms, whether it’s on their own website or smaller applications. As social media users—especially young generations—increase in a rapid manner, social media must take the different users and purposes of their platforms into consideration, before these harms exacerbate.
