15 Best Free Tumblr Themes For Artists 2019

Tumblr is a popular choice for artists when it comes to free blogging service. This platform offers a way for artists to connect with their fans, show off the artist works online, and build a following around your art.

There are also those who uses Tumblr as a way to gain experience, building their own personal portfolio and even getting critiques for improvement.

Tumblr for artists is more than just a networking platform to showcase your arts — it is an awesome platform to connect with your fans and build strong connections with one another!

If you are an artist and planning to create your own portfolio, starting a blog on Tumblr is the next best thing you could do. For starters, Tumblr has a very positive community that supports artworks and building fans around your arts.

If you’re an artist looking to get on Tumblr then you’ll need a great theme.

These are my top 15 picks for the best free Tumblr themes that tailor-made for artists. Whether you’re using Tumblr as a public portfolio or a personal sketchbook, all of these themes can work very well for all types of artwork.

Note: Did you know that there are many free Tumblr portfolio themes that you can choose from?

Square

The first of the many free Tumblr themes for artists is Square. Square is one of my favorite Tumblr themes for artists because it offers minimalist design. The overall design is very basic and grid-like page structures.

Thus, if you are looking for a simple Tumblr theme for artists or an art blog theme, you can’t go wrong with Square.

Perhaps the easiest theme to mesh with any artist’s style, Square is designed to look just like a portfolio. That means you can run this with your own Tumblr blog or use it as a public portfolio of work.

Square is an awesome and free Tumblr theme for artist … and that you should be using today.

Illustfolio 4

Illustfolio 4 is the fourth version of the Illustfolio theme for Tumblr. Each version comes with different layout, features and styles that you can choose from.

Among the entire list, I love Illustfolio 4 the best among the many portfolio tumblr themes — and carry on reading below to learn more about this free Tumblr theme.

Important note

The developer of this Tumblr theme doesn’t provide much support for older versions and therefore, it is best to stick with the newest ones.

Overall, Illustfolio 4 is a superb free Tumblr theme for artists.

Take a look at the demo page on GitHub and you will get a feel for how Illustfolio looks in your browser (or on your visitor’s browser).

This Tumblr theme supports custom image sizes and all the post types found in the Tumblr platform.

By far, this is the cleanest portfolio-styled Tumblr themes (if you concern of the everchanging Tumblr layout) and even better, you can download this theme for free!

The plus side of using this free tumblr theme is the availability of the documentation that explains how to install & customize the theme on any Tumblr blog.

For the record, Illusfolio 3 is also a nice Tumblr theme to go with. Take a look at the sample below.

If you are thinking of comparing both of them, check out this demo page for more information.

Overall, both Illustfolio 3 and Illustfolio 4 are great and free Tumblr themes for artists.

Void

Oblong grid layouts are very common nowadays and they first gained attention from Pinterest’s layout. It is clear that many art blog Tumblr themes are focusing in showcasing oblong grid layouts that is great in putting the spotlight on images.

These types of designs are called masonry grids and that’s exactly what you’ll find in the Void theme.

The current version of the Void theme comes with major features such as tags, custom images, Disqus comments and many more.

Void may not be the right Tumblr theme for everyone but it is certainly one of the best that offers grid-like images display.

Copycat

Looking for a cleaner and free Tumblr theme for artist?

Copycat is a great choice that comes with a masonry grid.

This Tumblr theme offers responsive layout that works with almost any kind of website from a typical blog to a larger portfolio—or even both.

Setting up Copycat theme on your Tumblr theme is easy and no advanced setting is required.

The best part, this Tumblr theme will automatically rezie all your images to fit into the grid properly!

Maverick

Tumblr is known as one of the best platforms for artists to showcase their portfolio because of two main reasons:

• Free web hosting services
• Free for life

If you’re one of those artists who wants to run your whole portfolio on Tumblr then Maverick is a theme you should check out.

As a matter of fact, I would rate Maverick as one of the best portfolio-style Tumblr themes I have ever used.

This theme allows you to add custom tags the top of the page to arrange the posts by categories (such as illustration, character design and environments).

The default layout allows you to pick a custom header image and layout that focuses heavily on your content.

The navigation of the theme allows your website visitors an easy time in searching, navigation and browsing images.

In short, Maverick is the best Tumblr themes for artists that put a lot of focus on user experience and content.

Sugar

Sugar is another unique Tumblr theme for artists because the way the theme is designed.

Variable grid designs provide a lot more expansive feel for website visitors compared to other Tumblr themes in the market.

The layout is extremely useful especially when it allows website visitors to easily skin your posts and see what you are writing about.

Sugar is an excellent Tumblr theme for artists who want to use the blog as a form of media and branding.

This theme focuses heavily in content and thus, it is best for those blogs with more content over images.

Eclipse

Art is always a visual medium. Artists who want to create portfolio understand that the best way to grab attention in the online world is by using big visuals.

That’s exactly what you see in the Eclipse Tumblr theme. It also runs on a grid structure but the grid takes up most of the page. All of it filled with massive thumbnail images.

At first glance, this Tumblr theme gives a very mood-felt like experience as all the images are larger in size. At the same time, the navigation is extremely fluid and allows visitors to move from one part to another easily.

This Tumblr theme for artist comes with several options for customization (layout design and colour scheme).

If you are a Tumblr newbie, this is one theme you need to use today.

Wicked

I love Wicked theme for more than one reason. For starters, this is a Tumblr theme that focuses heavily on images. As an artist, this is an absolutely no-brainer.

Besides that, the navigation and sharing options are easily available on each thumbnail that allows website visitors to quick access commands such as search, reblog or the save the image.

Wicked is a super lightweight Tumblr theme that ensures the website loads fast for your visitors. Therefore, you don’t have to worry about the long website loading speed.

Candice

Candice is not your average free Tumblr theme. It is a briliant portfolio theme that focuses in showcasing artworks of the artists.

This free Tumblr theme for artists runs on a single column layout so everything flows right down the page. You can even structure the content however you want whether it’s in a grid or a list of content.

The side navigation menu will automatically slides into view with a sleek animation which add a nice touch.

If you are still deciding if Candice is right for you, here’s one major advantages it has. The custom header section offers a wide space in the navigation for links and the theme gives a very professional design feel.

Plus, there are also 600+ typefaces from Google Fonts that you can use to customize the website.

Ten Toes

Ten Toes is a unique Tumblr theme that doesn’t fail to impress. 

This theme offers a huge masonry grid with custom thumbnails and text, while the side menu stays fixed while scrolling the page. 

Tacky? Absolutely!

Ten Toes is nice and for some, it can be a little too simple. There ain’t many features for customization but it still does its job excellently well.

Carter

Created by the popular Zen Themes, the Carter theme is a free Tumblr theme that is an excellent choice for artists.

The sidebar is fixed and thus, it will automatically follows you as you scroll. There are also many options in the design where you can change the background color, page effects, and typography.

Carter offers some of the most editable features out of all these major themes. But it’ll take some restyling to get it looking how you want so it may be a little more work than you wanna deal with.

Prestige

Prestige offers a wide range of custom settings from typography to color choices, grid spacing, and even the overall sidebar layout.

This Tumblr theme is very much basic and focuses mostly on the artwork and content for the artists.

Compared with others, the sidebar for Prestige is much smaller and very much to the side.

Prestige theme is okay but it has several flaws such as the limited designs. Nonetheless, this is still a very clean design if you are looking for a free Tumblr theme for artists.

Castle

Castle is a free Tumblr theme that puts a lot of emphasis on color and spacing. Instead of white space (which is godly in art and website design), it is replaced with different colours and unique usage of the space availability.

With Castle you can quickly add your own custom logo and even custom typography into the page. The sidebar has its own color scheme along with an editable background color to match whatever style you like.

Is this Tumblr theme right for me?

Castle is a great Tumblr theme if you are looking to showcase your portfolio or a blog, as an artist. The design allows you to put spotlight to what matters and not otherwise.

Foundre

The Foudre layout feels very experimental and certainly stands on its own outside of Tumblr.

As unique as it goes, this is a Tumblr theme that doesn’t ‘encourage’ clean and basic design. In other words, it is not your average Tumblr themes for artists.

Instead, it is a Tumblr theme that serves as a blogging theme and less like a portfolio page. This theme is great for entertainment and increasing your overall follower counts instead of serving as a public-portfolio.

If you are an artist who is looking for a Tumblr theme that is different from the rest, Foundre is a great choice to go with!

Pation

Are you looking for an ultra simple and free Tumblr theme for artist? 

If the answer is “yes”, you are in luck!

Pation is a Tumblr theme that focuses heavily on content and easy navigation for website visitors.

The biggest advantage using Pation is that visitors can quickly skim the page for images they like and click to see more.

The support of slideshows with multi-image posts along with custom background colours or patterns makes Pation one of the best free Tumblr themes for artists.

And the best part, you can easily change the entire layout from dark to light in just a few clicks. No coding skills required.

Which is the best free Tumblr themes for artists?

The short answer is “it depends.” There is no perfect Tumblr theme and there are many things you need to consider when choosing a Tumblr theme that is right for you.

For example, the type of artist you are and the way you want to showcase your artwork on Tumblr is extremely important.

You may also want to choose Tumblr portfolio themes, Tumblr art blog themes, artsy Tumblr themes or even, simple Tumblr themes for artists.

The above Tumblr themes are 15 of the best that you can choose from. There is absolutely no reason why you shouldn’t try these Tumblr themes for artists as you can download them for free!