About

#EmojiArtHistory is a Twitter hashtag associated with various strings of emoji characters that are supposed to be reinterpretations of famous artworks throughout history.

Origin

The idea for the hashtag came from a Tumblr post submitted by ladiesupfront^[1] on the evening of January 24th, which featured four iPhone screenshots of text messages sent from a friend who tried to recreate artistic masterpieces with emoji characters.

On February 11th, Brooklyn-based artist Man Bartlett reblogged^[2] the photoset, leading him to use the hashtag #EmojiArtHistory^[4] for the first time on Twitter with an emoji of a man and a gun to represent Chris Burden’s 1971 conceptual performance piece, Shoot.

Spread

Also on February 11th, art blog Hyperallergic^[3] featured a compilation post showcasing dozens of emoji art tweets, which further amplified the usage of #EmojiArtHistory to 1533 times that day alone.^[5] The next day, several art galleries and museums including Los Angeles’ J. Paul Getty Museum^[6] and London’s Tate Modern^[7] paid their homage to famous artworks with emoji tweets. On February 13th and 14th, #EmojiArtHistory tweets were featured on numerous art news blogs, such as ArtInfo^[8], the Nashville Scene^[9], Art Fag City,^[10] Animal New York^[11] and Complex Art&Design,^[12] as well as internet news and culture sites The Daily Dot^[13], Wired^[14] and the Daily What.^[15]

Notable Examples

Search Interest

[Not Currently Available]

External References