Where Did The Rat Fink Art Contest Go??

Due to widespread cheating in the voting, I've decided to cancel the Rat Fink Art Contest here on the Gnarly Magazine website.

* There will still be a winner, but instead of continuing the contest here, I'm going to host a smaller version on Instagram and crown a winner there. There are way too many incredible entries to simply walk away from this. One artist will still be featured in the upcoming Gnarly Magazine Issue #23.

Let me be clear—I am NOT blaming the artists.

The problem is the voting.

Even though every poll clearly states (in giant bold red letters) that each person gets one vote, there has been a ridiculous amount of over-voting in several rounds. I'm not going to bore you with all of the technical details, but I spend an enormous amount of time putting these contests together to promote artists. When people decide to game the system, it takes the fun out of it and turns it into hours of cleanup.

Online polls are never perfect. Every contest has a few people who try to cheat. Sometimes it's fans. Sometimes it's people trying to help an artist. Sometimes it's even artists trying to influence future matchups. Over the years, though, it was never a major issue. Most of the bogus votes were easy to spot and remove.

This contest was different.

In a couple of matchups, one or two people inflated the vote totals by nearly 150 votes. At that point, what was supposed to be a fun way to promote artists became more work than it was worth.

Because there were so many entries, I'm not starting the contest over.

Instead, I'm going to go back through the submissions, pick some favorites, and run a new version on Instagram. I may even bring in a few respected artists to help choose the winner. I'll figure out the details as soon as I can.

Unfortunately, this also means the website contests are coming to an end.

That's honestly a shame because these competitions have done exactly what I hoped they would do: introduce people to incredible artists, help artists gain new followers, and even lead to new commissions and jobs.

But life goes on.

I'll continue doing smaller contests on Instagram and will be focusing my energy on new projects—especially Gnarly Magazine's AWESOME RADICAL Kustom Art Invasion Tour coming in 2027.

I genuinely feel bad for every artist who entered. You all put time and talent into your work, and you deserve better than having the contest derailed by people abusing the voting system.

But at the end of the day, my time is better spent promoting artists than chasing down fraudulent votes.

Thanks for understanding, and keep an eye on the Gnarly Magazine Instagram page for Take Two of the Rat Fink Art Contest.

—Johnny