Valentine’s Day edition – But really for any holiday or date.
Are you struggling to find a gift for your artsy partner?
Well, here are some ideas for you, from an artist to another.
First of all, I’m originally writing this for Valentine’s day, but the “art gift” ideas would be varied enough so you can use them on other dates; Christmas, birthdays, …
And I’m not sticking only to romantic/cute presents, so there will be ideal gifts for different occasions.
The best of all is that I’ll keep it on a budget!
More or less around 35€ – because I know how expensive presents can be – and art supplies…
But if you want a more expensive gift, I will list some of them at the end or remember that you can buy two – or more till your heart’s content – of these instead of just one. And I made a 2nd part of this guide with more original and slightly more expensive gifts:
I’ve seen this kind of posts before about presents for artsy people written by people that are not artists, and trust me, most of them don’t know what are they talking about – and let’s be real: they lead to bad presents.
So, I’m here to bring you some gift ideas that I would buy myself – and other artists I know – or have already and find good/useful.
*Reminder that this post contains some affiliate links. This means I might get a small commission when you click and buy something with that link with no additional cost to you. However, my reviews and recommended products are not influenced by this, I’ll only recommend what I use and what I believe is good. Click here to read the disclaimer if you want more information*
1. Do not underestimate handmade things
As artists, we know and value how much hard work goes into doing crafty/handmade things, and I’m sure your artist does too.
So, don’t hesitate in handcraft a card, a personalized picture frame or a plant pot.
Anything you might think of, really.
And handcrafted doesn’t always mean cheaper though. Most of the times you have to invest in some materials.
Maybe check if he/she needs something you might be able to personalize or handmade yourself.
It doesn’t matter if you don’t know how to do it, YouTube is your friend!
2. An Artbook from a movie
This is one I very much enjoy – and actually is the default art gift of my bf lately, on every occasion.
But I really love to grow my art bookshelf, so I don’t ever complain!
And there are so many movie artbooks out there that are crazy inspiring!
I would recommend especially Studio Ghibli art books, they are super gorgeous and full of inspiration.
Furthermore, they still create a lot of scenes & backgrounds with watercolour paintings, which makes for a great amount of inspiring imagery.
There’s also all of Disney Pixar books, that look really amazing and I’ve heard they are really inspiring too – there next on my list.
And of course, there’s Disney too.
I’ll show you a few I have here – and also a few I have my eye on – that might be of your interest or give you some ideas.
Some of these last ones are some extra suggestions, just in case 😉
But, there are artbooks of almost all animated movies! – And sometimes even for other movies that have a lot of art and special effects, like the Avengers one I left up there.
I have a review of the Spirited Away artbook here on the blog, so you can see better how these look inside.
Oh, and games! – So take a look to see if you find something that might fit with your artist’s taste.
3. Kuretake watercolours
I got them for myself this past summer and gosh… It was like unboxing a present.
If your artist is into watercolours, or if you heard he/she might want to try them this is a beautiful gift option. Check them out here.
I might write a proper blog review for them, but I do have a video where I do some colour samples so you can see them and hear a bit more about them.
So here I’ll just add that they are really beautifully packaged and the quality seems really good.
The big pack feels like a great deal to me, cause they last a very long time – 2 years and still going for me…
And if your artist is learning about watercolours, send them over to my Ultimate watercolour blog series, where I tell them everything they need to know to get started. – And it’s free!
4. A sketchbook
We artist are always in the lookout for new sketchbooks, so why not gift us one?
Take a look on the sketchbooks they have already so you know what they use them for – if it’s just for pencils one with around 110g/m should be more than enough. Something like this one.
On the other hand, if they use liquid mediums search for a watercolour sketchbook, it would hold mostly everything.
There’s also a middle point for people that use fine liners/brush pens or markers in them, for that, I would recommend something like this. – a marker will bleed through the pages though, it’s hard to find one that holds it, it’s normal.
And pay attention to the size too! Go for the one they most usually work with or if anything else fails, an A5 it’s always a good middle point.
If you need more information on this to pick a sketchbook, check my detailed guide here, includes some recommendations too!
5. A small set of markers
Markers are expensive.
Really, really expensive.
That’s what immediately makes them a perfect art gift!
And a small 12 pieces set is a good place to start and stays under budget.
This is the first set I got and it worked perfectly fine for me to start, also, they’re good quality markers.
Furthermore, if your artist is into manga there’s a big chance he/she might want to try them for his/her illustrations, and there’s this manga set that has mostly the same tones for a smaller price.
If you want to go bigger, just gift them a larger set! Both Promarkers and Copics are really good brands.
6. An Artbook
Again, I’m a sucker for books and I have a ton that I want to buy.
But don’t trust just me here; most of the artist I see and follow love to grow their art-related library too, and have huge filled shelves in their studios.
Not only they are instructional, but also give us ton’s of inspiration, references and such.
In here I’m gonna talk about 2 kinds of art books: instruction books – books that teach you something – or artist’s artbooks.
If you know your artist wants to learn about something specific an instruction artbook could be a really great option – search though critics and opinions though, cause I had a few disappointments there.
And there’s the second option, an art book from an artist they like.
There’s a lot of inspiration to be taken from another artist, and most of the times it’s instructional too.
If you don’t know their taste in artist take a look at the suggestions I will leave bellow, maybe one of them might strike you as a great fit.
ARTIST’S BOOKS – a book from artists they like
Little note: I think it might be relatively easy to know if they like these artists, maybe just check if they follow them and like their posts on social media?
Sneaky, I know.
INSTRUCTION BOOKS
Here are some varied books to give you ideas.
I have a couple of these and I really like them: Drawing for fantasy artists and Cartoon Animation.
On the other hand, the rest are books I’ve heard recommended a lot of times, even as “must-have” books for illustrators; like Framed Ink or The animator Survival’s kit.
And Nathan Fowkes books on different subjects, cause I’ve taken a class with him on Schoolism and I think he’s a really great teacher.
7. A set of nice pencils.
No artist says no to a beautiful set of pencils.
Well, unless they really hate pencils.
They can be a set of colour pencils like this one – a few friends have them and really like them.
Or common charcoal drawing pencils if he/she is more into that. There are never enough pencils for an artist!
If you don’t see your artist partner use pencils much, maybe fineliners or brushpens are a good option too.
We love us a good brush pen!
I have a few recommendations on these on my “my art supplies” page here.
8. Art prints or art merchandise.
Again, here would be great if you knew about their taste in art/ favourite artists.
But in case you don’t, in pages like Etsy, Society6 & Redbubble there’s always a searching page where you can look through the art and merch of thousands of artists.
The tags and different categories help you get to the perfect gift.
I’m sure there’s something right for everyone in one of these pages! Here are just a few examples of what you can find:
mmartabc . Click to see.
Evangeline Gallagher. Click to see.
Angoes25. Click to see.
Also, I have a code for Society6 that gives you 10$ off your first purchase. You can redeem it by clicking here.
Shameless plug: I also have a society6 shop, so if you’re interested in checking it out to see if my work might be a good fit, I’ll leave you a link here! – And I appreciate it if you do check it out 🙂
9. A course subscription.
An artist is always learning, and the best way to learn these days it’s from the internet.
You can do it from the comfort of your home and at your own pace.
So why not give your art friend a nice gift subscription to a course or an online learning platform?
Right now, I’m trying Schoolism, one of the bests out there.
It has more than 30 courses on different things – and going up – so it’s sure he/she would find one that they like.
I have a full ongoing review on it as I’m going through the courses. I’ll leave it here if you want to know more.
If they’re interested in children’s book illustration, storyboarding and such SVS would be the way to go.
I still have to try it myself, but I’ve gotten the best advice from their podcast and youtube videos. Better than from any other source out there, so I trust them a lot.
And of course, you can go the general route and get a Skillshare subscription. They have a bit of everything there – from tech to photography, everything really – so it’s the safest gift of them all.
By clicking here you can get 2 months of free premium subscription to try it out!
A FEW LAST WORDS
And that’s it!
Hopefully, you got more than enough art gifts ideas from this post to give to your artist partner for a while.
Every link I have chosen carefully to give you a good option for everything I mentioned, but in the end, these are just ideas.
You are the one who knows about their taste and the one who should think about what would be more meaningful for them.
I would love to know what would be your favourite gift from the list in case you are an artist!
Want more art gifts ideas? Here are some of my latest reviews:
- ARTEZA 60 pack Gouache paint.
- Wacom Cintiq 16 review. – digital screen tablet.
- Artist 12 Pro review – digital screen tablet ideal if on a budget (or for beginners)
