I only recently learned about ArtSugar, a company that sells art that’s equal parts basic and unique pop culture type pieces. Honestly, I’m a little upset I didn’t know about it sooner. The company takes your favorite Instagrammers and turns their posts into prints you can actually hang on your wall. There’s even a whole “Food Pics” genre to choose from filled with paintings of avocado toast and Ina Garten, to photos of cakes and artfully designed rice krispie treats. It’s similar to the style of what my friends and I have had in our dorm rooms for the past three years.
How ArtSugar Works
ArtSugar works with artists to help them sell their prints, making it simple for them so that they can focus on doing more of what they love (creating art) instead of managing sales. The art starts at $50 and can go upwards of around $600. (This obviously also depends on the size and if you want something custom done, like a family portrait, for example.)
ArtSugar also gives back, and in a couple of ways. First, the company donates 5 percent of the proceeds from each purchase to one of their pre-vetted charities like ASPCA and St. Jude Research Foundation, among many others. You can also purchase a piece from one of their Thoughtful Collaborations, which featured March For Our Lives earlier this year. These collabs allow artists to choose a cause they believe in and ArtSugar handles everything else to make sure a portion of the proceeds go to that cause.
The second way the company gives back is through what they call In-Kind Product Donations. This enables artists to donate physical artwork for events held by non-profits they support in order to help make the events a success.
There’s a Wide Range of Artists
ArtSugar currently has 40 artists whose artwork they sell on their site. They come from all over the world and have different specialties regarding how they create their art and what styles they prefer. There are portrait painters, provocative photographers, and even super viral artists.
The website’s founder and CEO, Alix Greenberg, sells her own artwork on the website under the campaign Portraits For Good, the original name of ArtSugar. But I had the pleasure of speaking to two of the Instagram artists, Jessica Stempel (@jstemps), an emerging NYC pop artist and illustrator, and Jessica Siskin (@mister_krisp), known for her rice krispie treat art and author of “Treat Yourself!”
Although artists can apply to ArtSugar online to get involved, Stempel and Siskin were actually both approached by Greenberg who came across their respective Instagram pages. “It felt like a natural fit,” Siskin said.
Stempel added that she’s “always in the process of finding a way to make some kind of a statement with [her] art” which fits with the philanthropic aspect of ArtSugar perfectly.
Siskin told me that she finds inspo everywhere, especially her customers. “My customers are a huge source of inspiration and always have interesting requests.” She finds this especially rewarding because “ArtSugar has made it possible for people who aren’t able to pick up a treat locally to have a piece of Misterkrisp.”
So if you’re an up and coming artist, or if you simply want to hang some pretty cool art on your wall, check out the site. Either way, it’s all for a good cause.
