Menu

Art Websites that banned AI art

Regarding the recent situation – of artworks and private photos being stolen by AI software developers, and the flood of AI-generated images on popular Art platforms, I’ve decided to gather a list of Art Websites where uploading AI images is banned.

Some of these websites were created mainly as an alternative to Artstation ( see: Protest on Artstation “NO TO AI”). Despite artists’ requests, Artstation and Deviantart didn’t ban uploading AI images. Therefore, artists started looking for new places, where they don’t have to compete with artificially generated images based on stolen artworks.

Quick List:

Art Websites:
1. Artgram
2. Cara.app
3. Newgrounds
4. Fur Affinity
5. InkBlot.art
6. Artfol.me
7. PurplePort
Art Groups:
1. Level Up!
2. Digital Artists Group
3. OC|Art|Requests|Commissions|+
4. Digital Painting
Stock Websites:
1. Shutterstock
2. Getty Images

 


Art Websites

I’ve asked on multiple FB art groups about places that don’t allow uploading AI images, and here’s the list I gathered from the answers. I divided the list into 3: Art Websites, Art Groups, and Stock Websites.

1. Artgram

Official website: Artgram.co
Twitter: @artgramco
Discord: Artgram

This website was created by Cihan Tas (founder) and Caner Bozkurt ( He’s working on innovative solutions to automatically detect AI artwork and block it, as well as techniques to protect your art with a digital signature that can be used to prove ownership.)
Artgram.co seems to have taken the major role of Artstation’s alternative. It was created as a response to the NO TO AI protest on Artstation, and its main goal is to protect its users from AI software.

  • Our core mission and vision is simple, but powerful:
  1. Protect artists and their work.
  2. Give them a safe space to present their artwork to potential employers and fans to make money doing the work they’re most passionate about.

Read the full manifesto here: artgram.co/mission

Since a few days of my registration there, I’ve already noticed some of the artists I used to follow on Artstation, including many professional artists. The website’s design resembles Artstation’s so moving to Artgram.co is very easy.

 


2. Cara.app

Official website: cara.app
Twitter: @Cara_HQ
Instagram: @cara_artists
Discord: Cara Beta

Cara was one of the most common answers to my question. The platform is being built by a group of passionate volunteers and led by CGHUB alum Jingna Zhang, together with Katie Borisov and Jake RT. It was described to me more as a social media for artists, and someone even called it the “Twitter for Artists”. Below is Cara’s statement regarding the AI issue.

  • What is Cara’s stance on AI art?
  1. We believe artists’ rights should be respected, and the current use of creators’ work without their consent in datasets is unethical and cannot remain this way.

  2. We do not plan to host AI art until the ethical issues around datasets are resolved.

  3. After laws are passed to clearly protect artists, we are open to the possibility of hosting AI art, but we believe that it should be labelled clearly and people should be able to search for human-made art and AI art with posts tagged accordingly.

To have a portfolio page on Cara, you need an invite from someone with a portfolio account. You can also create an account using the public sign-up link and fill a validation form – however, this way it can take several weeks to be accepted.

 


3. Newgrounds

Official website: newgrounds.com

I don’t think I need to introduce this website to anyone. But here’s a brief description to the new artists – it’s one of the oldest and biggest communities of artists, game developers, musicians, voice actors, and writers who create and share some of the best stuff on the web.

The Newground’s statement towards AI can be found in their Art Guidelines, where they explicitly said that AI images are banned on their platform.

  • AI-generated art is not allowed in the Art Portal. This includes using tools such as Midjourney, Dall-E, and CrAIyon, in addition fractal generators and websites like ArtBreeder, where the user selects two images and they are combined into a new image via machine learning.

They allow AI images to be used only as an inspiration for your artwork, or as a small, not really important part of your work, like for example as a background for your original character.

 


4. Fur Affinity

Official website: furaffinity.net

Fur Affinity is the furry fandom’s largest online community, dedicated mainly to art. Therefore, the issue of uploading AI images to this platform was also addressed. In the result, Fur Affinity’s Upload Policy has been updated, and this exact paragraph was added:

2.13 Artificial Intelligence (AI)

Content made using AI, machine learning, or similar generators is not allowed, including derivative works created from it (e.g. stories, audio, backgrounds, paint-overs, using one’s own content to generate new content).

So, saying briefly, no AI content in any form is allowed.
I’ve snooped on some forums and found FA users’ complaints about FA removing some of their drawings. It turned out that they used AI software, and in comparison to Newgrounds, even generating backgrounds in AI isn’t allowed on FA.

 


5. InkBlot.art

Official website: inkblot.art

I didn’t know about InkBlot until doing my research for this list. InkBlot was created in 2020 by Jay Brown, who is a Graphic Designer & Hobbyist Artist himself. Of course, he has a team of artists (Harper, Ren, Angel) and volunteers that help him to build InkBlot.
InkBlot was built as a social platform for artists (similarly to the DeviantArt). In 2022 it gained over 20k users.

  • As per our Terms of Service we have a strict zero tolerance for AI, NFTs or crypto services.
    InkBlot does not believe in nor does it EVER want to support such ideas or systems.

I went to InkBlot’s content guidelines page and found a more detailed explanation why AI-generated images aren’t allowed on this platform:

“Artificial Intelligence Art We will be removing all AI generated art from InkBlot. This is regards to art/submissions created using Any AI generators including but not limited to Midjounrey, Dall-E and CrAIyon or partial generators using machine learning. AI used for visual reference or as a tool for inspiration is OK with clear and obvious credit towards the use of it. But users should not be uploading any parts of the generated image to their profile gallery or commissions and claiming it as their own. Paintovers or drawovers are NOT OK. Given the fact that AI generators are trained and learned on the art of others, this would violate our Copyright Guidelines.”

InkBlot’s moderators notify users whose content they removed, however, suspension or termination of a user’s account can be done without any notice.

 


6. Artfol.me

Official website: artfol.me
Twitter: @artfolapp

This is a new Art social platform that I haven’t yet fully explored. At the moment, access is limited to Prisma users and Patreon supporters. The full services are available via the Android and IOS Artfol app. I got info from my artistic friends that, unfortunately, the app lags on their smartphones, and therefore they can’t use it. But I’m looking forward to the website version, which will become available to everyone in 2023.

Back to the main topic – what Artfol thinks of AI-generated content?  As it’s listed here, that’s pretty obvious that there aren’t many positive thoughts about AI.

  • What is not allowed on Artfol
    Any content created entirely or partially using AI generative models (such as AI models using the LAION dataset) will be removed from Artfol.

You can find that statement in Artfol’s guidelines.

 


7. PurplePort

Official website: purpleport.com

PurplePort is a website that connects photographers with models. It also acts as a portfolio for models and photographers.

  • “Due to the rise of machine-generated images, we have decided to ban this type of image. Uploading images generated using services (such as Midjourney/DALL-E/Craiyon/Stable Diffusion/etc.), where you type a phrase or description of the desired image and a machine algorithm (often called A.I) creates an image for you, is banned from PurplePort until further notice.”

You can find more info and details  here: “Artmageddon: The rise of the machines, and banning machine-generated images”

 


Art Groups

When I started asking about Art websites that ban AI on FB groups and reddit, I noticed that some of them updated their rules and added the rule “NO AI ART”. Here’s a section dedicated to art forums and groups that don’t fully match the “Art website” definition. I will keep updating this section only with the most popular art groups.

 

1. Level Up!

Info: Facebook group

Level Up! (created by Wojtek Fus and Darek Zabrocki) is one of the largest FB groups dedicated to digital art. It’s a great place to learn as there are many art resources published, and you can receive helpful critiques from the more advanced artist. You can actually find here many people who work in the art industry. Publishing here AI art can result in an immediate ban.

  • “Due to the recent information and evidence about AI art stealing data from real artist, we have decided to just deny any type or form of AI art that you can find, not anymore as reference, not anymore as paint over, just NO AI ANYMORE.”

2. Digital Artists Group

Info: Facebook group

Digital Artists Group is a group created for sharing and learning about Digital Art, meaning anyone at any skill level can join. If you are an artist, hobbyist or spectator of digital art, then this is the group for you.

  • Due to the recent discoveries and legal scrutiny within the art realm when it comes to AI art, we shall ban it outright. It’s flooded everywhere and we can at least make a safe place for us digital artists who actually work hard at what we do. Sorry for taking so long to take a stand, it seemed like a great resource at first. But now after stealing people’s art outright “even sadly a the late Kim Jung Gi” and bullying said artists after taking their hard work is ENOUGH!! If you use AI, use it for reference, have fun in these new times. But don’t be an ass hole. And as of right now. DONT post it here. You will be banned permanently from the group.

3. OC|Art|Requests|Commissions|+

Info: Facebook group
It’s a group dedicated to selling art, commission, requests. If you want to commission someone to draw your OC, this is the group that you should join.

  • “We DO NOT condone ANY AI art being sold in this group. It is theft, regardless if you fell for the scam of “paying for commercial use”. If you are found to be selling AI generated art, you will be banned immediately.”

4. Digital Painting

Info: subReddit

The purpose of r/DigitalPainting is to nurture growing artists. Be prepared to receive constructive critique on your art.

  • AI generated images are now banned.
    r/digitalpainting is for people who want to get better at painting, not writing prompts. If I find you posting AI generated images, you will receive a permanent ban. I don’t think I can make myself clearer than that.Edited to add that there is now an AI report option – but don’t use it willy nilly. At the very least, check the user’s history first.”

Stock Websites

1. Shutterstock

Shutterstock is an American provider of stock photography, stock footage, stock music, and editing tools. Here, selling AI-generated images isn’t allowed.

  • “Will all AI-generated content be accepted at Shutterstock?

Shutterstock will not allow AI-generated content to be submitted for sale on our platform. We want to ensure contributors can prove IP ownership of all submitted content and also want to be confident that artists are properly compensated if and when their work is used in AI training models. Given the availability of various AI content generation models in the marketplace, we are unable to verify the model source for most AI-generated content and therefore are unable to ensure all artists who were involved in the generation of each piece of content are compensated. You can learn more about our policy here.”


2. Getty Images 

Getty Images Holdings, Inc. is an American visual media company and is a supplier of stock images, editorial photography, video and music for business and consumers, with a library of over 477 million assets.

It is said that Getty Images banned selling AI-generated images on their platform: Getty Images bans AI-generated content over fears of legal challenges. However, I’m not able to find the direct statement from Getty Images on their website.

 

Add a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

*Comments are manually moderated. It will take some time before it appears.