r/art subreddit under new management after an artist was banned for mentioning their art prints

feanne
2025-12-04T06:49:16Z

On November 24, 2025, Artist Hayden Clay (reddit user Strawbear) was permanently banned from the r/art subreddit for mentioning their art prints. In addition, all their content-- many years' worth-- was also removed from the subreddit.

r/art has always had extremely strict rules against self-promotion, to the extent of being actively hostile to artists. For example, if you post your art there, you are not allowed to have a link to your website in your reddit user profile, and you may not put a watermark which includes your social media handle. As of December 3, 2025, their official rules stated:

9. DO NOT SPAM. No art sales, no links to social media, stores, or anything spammy.
DO NOT mention SALES or SOCIAL MEDIA. AT ALL.
DO NOT MENTION ART SALES. AT ALL.
DO NOT LINK TO SOCIAL MEDIA. Or talk about your social media, or include any watermark that references your social media.
DO NOT link to a sales site, or have a link to your sales site in your personal profile, or have a username that refers to a sales site.
Basically, if your Reddit account exists only to sell your art, DO NOT post here.
Broken record time: This applies to anything that looks like spam. ANYTHING. For example: product marketing, fundraising, charities, surveys, contests, collaborations, exhibitions, requests for submissions, research projects, business ideas, requests for prints, social media usernames, links to sales pages, website promotions, sneaky usernames, and whatever else we feel is spam.
If you still think, somehow, your spam doesn't fit this list, DO NOT post here.

Hayden Clay's post prompted plenty of backlash against the r/art mod team. On November 27, Hayden Clay tweeted that the r/art mod team rage-quit, leaving the subreddit locked. CORRECTION: Sorry for my mistake-- the mod team did not rage quit, it was one mod that removed everyone and then pretended like everyone decided to quit. Thanks to @teaearlgraycold and @CannibalisticApple for the correction!

On December 2, the r/art new mod team introduced themselves. They are promising to have updated "non-draconian" rules in the next few days. They understand that artists need to make a living and advertise their work, and want to moderate the subreddit in a way that balances that against spam. They've been unbanning users (including Hayden Clay) and they said that out of 5000+ bans issued in 2025, only 60+ had a valid reason.

UPDATE: As of December 4, r/art has been reopened, with updated rules in place. I think this is much more fair with regards to self-promotion:

5. Advertising / Self-promotion
Promotion/advertising of products or services (e.g., art materials, software) is not permitted without mod approval.
Links to personal sites/socials/merch should be in your Reddit profile, and can be mentioned once in your post body and sparingly in comments if asked. Direct links to personal sites/socials/merch should only be shared in our weekly Wednesday megathread.
Promotion of OnlyFans or other pornographic sites is not permitted.

I remember being new to reddit and thinking about sharing my art in the r/art subreddit, but then I was turned off by their anti-artist rules. I'm pleasantly surprised by this turn of events-- though I wish it had happened earlier. The new mods sound reasonable, and have expressed dismay about the negativity of the previous mods:

Honestly it's pretty insane and a bit depressing seeing the modmails from the old team. Very rude, disrespectful, and extremely harsh to people making simple, innocent mistakes, older people or non-English speaking people misunderstanding little things, etc. Those mods were seriously troubled.

I'm glad that it looks like reddit's most established art subreddit has a better future ahead thanks to the new mods.

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