Why It Matters to Be Present Online as a Creative
How Today’s Artists, Musicians, and Cultural Entrepreneurs Turn Algorithms into Artistry
In the not-so-distant past, being an artist meant hiding in the solitude of a studio, waiting patiently—or dramatically—for recognition. But in today’s digital landscape, solitude won’t cut it. If your art isn’t online, it might as well not exist. The internet is the new gallery wall, the concert stage, the critic’s desk, the fan meet-and-greet. And if you, dear creative, are still hesitant to post, stream, narrate, vlog, or engage, the hard truth is this: someone else will, and they will be remembered.
Building a digital presence isn’t a form of vanity. It’s a form of visibility. Your creative voice—whether it sings, sketches, sculpts, or speaks—needs to be heard in the public square. In 2025, that square is digital. It stretches across Instagram’s visual theatre, LinkedIn’s professional hallways, YouTube’s immersive stories, and Spotify’s melodic reach.
The Artist Is Online
Singer Armaan Malik once said, “I want fans to know the story behind every note. That’s why I post—it’s a connection, not promotion.” His journey from Bollywood playback singer to international pop star owes much to this philosophy. Armaan treats his digital platforms as storytelling vessels. On Instagram, he shares the emotions behind his lyrics; on Spotify, he curates sounds that echo his evolution. Fans are no longer passive listeners—they’re participants in his narrative arc.
Similarly, Vivek Dahiya, once recognized solely for his television roles, has reimagined his identity as a lifestyle vlogger. Alongside his wife, actress Divyanka Tripathi, Vivek launched Travel with Divek, a YouTube series that captures the behind-the-scenes messiness and joy of married life. Their content—quirky, casual, and completely relatable—strips away celebrity polish and reveals personality. On Instagram, Vivek’s fitness videos, family posts, and cheeky captions further reinforce his everyman charm. His audience doesn’t just admire him—they feel like they know him.
This sense of digital intimacy is echoed by visual artists like Abhay Sehgal, whose handle Art by Sehgal has become synonymous with pop-surrealist storytelling. Sehgal’s Instagram functions like a living, evolving sketchbook. Through time-lapse Reels, captioned process videos, and audience Q&As, he transforms each painting into a journey shared. He doesn’t merely post art—he narrates it. Whether collaborating with Prada or launching his streetwear label CODEBRWN, Sehgal demonstrates that an artist today is not just a maker, but a narrator, a brand, a strategist, and a voice.
The Role of Platforms
Instagram remains the most natural habitat for creatives. Its visual-first design, seamless integration of short-form video, and global user base have made it the go-to platform for artists, musicians, designers, and actors alike. But presence must be purposeful. Audiences crave personality as much as professionalism. Mira Rajput Kapoor, for example, has no filmography to her name, but her Ayurveda-based lifestyle content, minimalist aesthetics, and earnest wellness advice have made her a beloved digital figure. She built her influence through consistency and care. Her content doesn’t sell—it suggests, inspires, and invites.
Then there is Anpu Varkey, a muralist whose work spans city walls across India. Her Instagram acts as a public archive of ephemeral art. Each mural, once vulnerable to urban erasure, gains digital permanence. When she shares process videos of climbing scaffolding, mixing paints, or painting under the sun, her audience becomes part of the making. What was once an unseen act of labor becomes a shared performance of place-making.
YouTube, too, offers depth. While Instagram excels in spontaneity, YouTube gives space to narrative. Artists like Santanu Hazarika use it to showcase not just what they create, but how and why. His monochrome ink work and graffiti murals, documented through vlogs and studio walkthroughs, demystify the art process. Viewers witness the frustrations and breakthroughs. They begin to understand that art isn’t magic—it’s ritual, patience, and obsession.
Musicians, on the other hand, lean heavily on Spotify. It remains the most direct conduit between sound and listener. But when paired with Instagram snippets, YouTube music videos, and behind-the-scenes stories, it becomes part of a larger, multidimensional experience. Fans don’t just hear a song—they watch it come alive in a reel, hear its origin story in a podcast, and witness its evolution across platforms.
Enter LinkedIn: The Unexpected Ally
While LinkedIn might seem like a boardroom rather than a studio, it has, surprisingly, emerged as a powerful space for artists and creative professionals. Once dominated by tech recruiters and finance bros, LinkedIn is now fertile ground for storytelling, case studies, thought leadership, and cross-disciplinary visibility.
Photographers, illustrators, and musicians have begun using it not just to announce new work, but to explain it. A portrait series can be reframed as a cultural study. A music tour can become a lesson in logistics, branding, and audience segmentation. For many, the professional tone of LinkedIn offers what Instagram doesn’t: a longer shelf life for thoughtful content.
Designer Sera Tajima grew her following into the tens of thousands not with memes or moodboards, but with high-value articles, personal stories, and insights about design in business. One article received over 2 million impressions. Likewise, photographer Seth Stern gained over 100,000 impressions in a single month by simply documenting the creative process and its impact on clients.
LinkedIn allows for a slower, more deliberate kind of presence—one where commentary and context are welcomed. For visual artists and musicians looking to connect with curators, editors, educators, or brand managers, LinkedIn is a quiet powerhouse. Its users are not just fans—they are potential collaborators, patrons, and mentors.
The Symphony of Cross-Platform Presence
What emerges is not a platform hierarchy but a constellation. Each medium offers a unique lens through which your creativity can be seen and understood:
Instagram shows the pulse of your practice—your rhythms, aesthetics, and mood.
YouTube builds narrative—taking followers through longer arcs of creation and reflection.
Spotify delivers your voice to headphones across the world—unseen but deeply intimate.
LinkedIn contextualizes your craft, aligning it with industry, value, and strategy.
Artists today are not expected to dominate every platform, but to understand what each offers—and to show up accordingly. The muralist’s reel on Instagram becomes a case study on LinkedIn. The singer’s album on Spotify becomes a storytelling vlog on YouTube. The same work, refracted through different mediums, reaches different minds.
Lessons from the Digitally Fluent
The creatives we’ve examined—Vivek, Armaan, Abhay, Mira, Anpu, Santanu, Siddhant—succeed not because they post more, but because they post with purpose. They maintain rhythm without burnout. They reveal enough to intrigue, but not so much that mystery vanishes. They talk back. They laugh. They teach. They share.
This is not accidental. This is craft.
Being online does not mean becoming a content machine. It means being findable. It means sharing your essence in formats that suit your personality. It means inviting the world to not just witness your work—but walk alongside it.
To Be Present is to Be Possible
Presence is the threshold to opportunity. Whether you're a conceptual sculptor in Baroda, a beatmaker in Shillong, or a performance poet in Chicago, the question is not whether you’re talented. It’s whether you’re seen.
And so, in this age of relentless scrolling and fleeting attention, the artist who dares to be present—on their own terms—does not disappear. They endure.
As writer Austin Kleon puts it best:
“Make stuff you love and talk about stuff you love and you’ll attract people who love that kind of stuff.”
Visibility, after all, is not vanity. It’s viability.
So go on—turn the camera on. Hit upload. Share your process. Tell your truth. Show your art. Build the stage, pixel by pixel.
The world is waiting.