Album Art Meme

2011Photoshop / image parodysemi-active

Published March 10, 2026 · Updated March 24, 2026

Also known as: Clip Art Covers · Clipart Covers

Album Art Meme, better known as Clip Art Covers, is a Photoshop meme format where iconic album covers, video game boxes, and DVD cases are recreated using cheap clip art graphics and the Comic Sans font. The trend started in December 2011 on Tumblr and picked up steam through 2012 and 2013 as it spread to forums, Reddit, and gaming blogs1. The deliberate clash between beloved, well-designed cover art and aggressively ugly clip art recreations is the entire joke.

album art memesclip art memescover art parody memestypography memescomic sans memes

Overview

The format is simple: take a famous piece of cover art, then rebuild it entirely from clip art images, stock graphics, and the Comic Sans typeface. The worse it looks, the better it works. Nirvana's *Nevermind* baby becomes a cartoon infant. The moody atmosphere of a game like *BioShock* gets flattened into a kindergarten art project. The humor comes from the gap between the original's careful design and the replacement's aggressive mediocrity3.

While the concept started with music albums, it quickly expanded to video game box art, movie posters, and DVD covers3. The use of Comic Sans is a key ingredient. The font is widely regarded as the design world's punching bag, and pairing it with serious or artistic cover imagery amplifies the absurdity1.

On December 13, 2011, an anonymous creator launched the "Clip Art Covers" blog on Tumblr3. The blog's purpose was straightforward: recreate well-known album covers using nothing but clip art. The very first post tackled Nirvana's 1991 grunge landmark *Nevermind*, an album that had sold over 30 million copies worldwide and is regularly ranked among the greatest albums ever made2. Reducing its iconic underwater baby photograph to a crude clip art rendering set the tone for everything that followed.

Over the next two years, the blog churned out more than 365 clip art recreations3. The Tumblr blog itself became a small community, with the creator occasionally posting commentary about the responses they received1.

Origin & Background

Platform
Tumblr (original blog), Facepunch Forums / Reddit (viral spread)
Key People
Unknown, Robbl
Date
2011

On December 13, 2011, an anonymous creator launched the "Clip Art Covers" blog on Tumblr3. The blog's purpose was straightforward: recreate well-known album covers using nothing but clip art. The very first post tackled Nirvana's 1991 grunge landmark *Nevermind*, an album that had sold over 30 million copies worldwide and is regularly ranked among the greatest albums ever made2. Reducing its iconic underwater baby photograph to a crude clip art rendering set the tone for everything that followed.

Over the next two years, the blog churned out more than 365 clip art recreations3. The Tumblr blog itself became a small community, with the creator occasionally posting commentary about the responses they received1.

How It Spread

The concept jumped from Tumblr to forums in early 2012. On February 16, 2012, Facepunch Forums member Robbl started a thread inviting users to submit their own clip art versions of album, film, and game covers3. Robbl kicked things off with a clip art take on the first-person shooter *BioShock*, and the thread took off from there.

The meme hit its biggest wave in April 2013. On April 21, the Aurorashaman Tumblr blog posted a clip art version of the *Pokémon Blue* Game Boy cover that racked up over 19,200 notes in just three days3. The next day, Gawker Media's gaming blog Kotaku ran an article spotlighting notable examples from the trend3. On April 23, NeoGAF member sixteen-bit created a dedicated thread for clip art video game covers, pulling in more than 380 responses within 24 hours3. That same day, Redditor Celeste1492 posted a clip art *Mass Effect 2* cover to the /r/MassEffect subreddit, earning upwards of 580 upvotes and 35 comments3.

The trend also spread organically on Tumblr through the #clipart tag, where users contributed their own recreations outside the original blog3.

Platforms

RedditTwitterReddit

Timeline

2023-01-15

First appears

2023-06-01

Goes viral

2024-01-01

Continues in use

2025-01-01

Album Art Meme is still actively used and shared across platforms

View on Google Trends

How to Use This Meme

Creating a Clip Art Cover typically follows this process:

1

Pick an iconic cover — Albums, games, movies, or TV shows all work. The more recognizable and well-designed the original, the funnier the result.

2

Rebuild it in clip art — Replace every visual element with the cheapest-looking clip art equivalent you can find. Stock graphics from the early 2000s or default Microsoft Office clip art are ideal.

3

Use Comic Sans — Replace all text (artist names, album titles, game logos) with Comic Sans. This is non-negotiable for the classic format.

4

Match the layout — The composition should roughly mirror the original so viewers can still recognize what's being parodied. The recognition is what makes the downgrade funny.

Create Your Own

Cultural Impact

The Clip Art Covers trend tapped into a broader internet fascination with bad design as comedy. Comic Sans had been the internet's favorite font to mock since at least the mid-2000s, and this meme weaponized that disdain in a creative way1. Gaming outlets like Kotaku gave the trend mainstream visibility within nerd culture, and the NeoGAF thread showed how enthusiastically gaming communities adopted the format3.

The concept also anticipated later album art parody trends. In 2024, Charli XCX's *Brat* album cover, with its intentionally minimal design, spawned its own wave of cover art parodies through the "Brat Generator" website, where users created custom text in the same style4. While not a direct descendant, Brat Generator echoed the same spirit of accessible album art remixing that Clip Art Covers pioneered years earlier.

Fun Facts

The original Clip Art Covers blog produced over 365 entries in its first two years, averaging roughly one new parody every other day3.

The first-ever Clip Art Cover was a recreation of Nirvana's *Nevermind*, an album that had topped the Billboard 200 in January 1992 after replacing Michael Jackson's *Dangerous* at number one2.

The blog's creator seemed motivated partly by the reactions they got from designers horrified by Comic Sans usage, once posting about how comments like "it's worse than a demon, it's... COMIC SANS" made the whole project worthwhile1.

The Pokémon Blue clip art cover was the single most viral individual post in the trend's history, pulling 19,200+ Tumblr notes in three days3.

The NeoGAF clip art thread got more than 380 responses in a single day, making it one of the forum's most active threads that week3.

Derivatives & Variations

Video Game Box Art Variants

— The original album focus expanded to game covers, with *BioShock*, *Pokémon Blue*, and *Mass Effect 2* among popular targets[3].

DVD and Film Poster Versions

— Facepunch Forums users extended the format to movie and TV covers alongside albums and games[3].

Tumblr #clipart Tag Community

— Beyond the original blog, users posted their own clip art recreations under the #clipart hashtag on Tumblr[3].

Frequently Asked Questions

References (4)

  1. 1
    Clipart Coversarticle
  2. 2
    Album Art Meme - Know Your Memeencyclopedia
  3. 3
    Brat (internet meme)encyclopedia
  4. 4
    Nevermindencyclopedia

Album Art Meme

2011Photoshop / image parodysemi-active

Published March 10, 2026 · Updated March 24, 2026

Also known as: Clip Art Covers · Clipart Covers

Album Art Meme, better known as Clip Art Covers, is a Photoshop meme format where iconic album covers, video game boxes, and DVD cases are recreated using cheap clip art graphics and the Comic Sans font. The trend started in December 2011 on Tumblr and picked up steam through 2012 and 2013 as it spread to forums, Reddit, and gaming blogs1. The deliberate clash between beloved, well-designed cover art and aggressively ugly clip art recreations is the entire joke.

album art memes clip art memes cover art parody memes typography memes comic sans memes

Overview

The format is simple: take a famous piece of cover art, then rebuild it entirely from clip art images, stock graphics, and the Comic Sans typeface. The worse it looks, the better it works. Nirvana's *Nevermind* baby becomes a cartoon infant. The moody atmosphere of a game like *BioShock* gets flattened into a kindergarten art project. The humor comes from the gap between the original's careful design and the replacement's aggressive mediocrity3.

While the concept started with music albums, it quickly expanded to video game box art, movie posters, and DVD covers3. The use of Comic Sans is a key ingredient. The font is widely regarded as the design world's punching bag, and pairing it with serious or artistic cover imagery amplifies the absurdity1.

On December 13, 2011, an anonymous creator launched the "Clip Art Covers" blog on Tumblr3. The blog's purpose was straightforward: recreate well-known album covers using nothing but clip art. The very first post tackled Nirvana's 1991 grunge landmark *Nevermind*, an album that had sold over 30 million copies worldwide and is regularly ranked among the greatest albums ever made2. Reducing its iconic underwater baby photograph to a crude clip art rendering set the tone for everything that followed.

Over the next two years, the blog churned out more than 365 clip art recreations3. The Tumblr blog itself became a small community, with the creator occasionally posting commentary about the responses they received1.

Origin & Background

Platform
Tumblr (original blog), Facepunch Forums / Reddit (viral spread)
Key People
Unknown, Robbl
Date
2011

On December 13, 2011, an anonymous creator launched the "Clip Art Covers" blog on Tumblr3. The blog's purpose was straightforward: recreate well-known album covers using nothing but clip art. The very first post tackled Nirvana's 1991 grunge landmark *Nevermind*, an album that had sold over 30 million copies worldwide and is regularly ranked among the greatest albums ever made2. Reducing its iconic underwater baby photograph to a crude clip art rendering set the tone for everything that followed.

Over the next two years, the blog churned out more than 365 clip art recreations3. The Tumblr blog itself became a small community, with the creator occasionally posting commentary about the responses they received1.

How It Spread

The concept jumped from Tumblr to forums in early 2012. On February 16, 2012, Facepunch Forums member Robbl started a thread inviting users to submit their own clip art versions of album, film, and game covers3. Robbl kicked things off with a clip art take on the first-person shooter *BioShock*, and the thread took off from there.

The meme hit its biggest wave in April 2013. On April 21, the Aurorashaman Tumblr blog posted a clip art version of the *Pokémon Blue* Game Boy cover that racked up over 19,200 notes in just three days3. The next day, Gawker Media's gaming blog Kotaku ran an article spotlighting notable examples from the trend3. On April 23, NeoGAF member sixteen-bit created a dedicated thread for clip art video game covers, pulling in more than 380 responses within 24 hours3. That same day, Redditor Celeste1492 posted a clip art *Mass Effect 2* cover to the /r/MassEffect subreddit, earning upwards of 580 upvotes and 35 comments3.

The trend also spread organically on Tumblr through the #clipart tag, where users contributed their own recreations outside the original blog3.

Platforms

RedditTwitterReddit

Timeline

2023-01-15

First appears

2023-06-01

Goes viral

2024-01-01

Continues in use

2025-01-01

Album Art Meme is still actively used and shared across platforms

View on Google Trends

How to Use This Meme

Creating a Clip Art Cover typically follows this process:

1

Pick an iconic cover — Albums, games, movies, or TV shows all work. The more recognizable and well-designed the original, the funnier the result.

2

Rebuild it in clip art — Replace every visual element with the cheapest-looking clip art equivalent you can find. Stock graphics from the early 2000s or default Microsoft Office clip art are ideal.

3

Use Comic Sans — Replace all text (artist names, album titles, game logos) with Comic Sans. This is non-negotiable for the classic format.

4

Match the layout — The composition should roughly mirror the original so viewers can still recognize what's being parodied. The recognition is what makes the downgrade funny.

Create Your Own

Cultural Impact

The Clip Art Covers trend tapped into a broader internet fascination with bad design as comedy. Comic Sans had been the internet's favorite font to mock since at least the mid-2000s, and this meme weaponized that disdain in a creative way1. Gaming outlets like Kotaku gave the trend mainstream visibility within nerd culture, and the NeoGAF thread showed how enthusiastically gaming communities adopted the format3.

The concept also anticipated later album art parody trends. In 2024, Charli XCX's *Brat* album cover, with its intentionally minimal design, spawned its own wave of cover art parodies through the "Brat Generator" website, where users created custom text in the same style4. While not a direct descendant, Brat Generator echoed the same spirit of accessible album art remixing that Clip Art Covers pioneered years earlier.

Fun Facts

The original Clip Art Covers blog produced over 365 entries in its first two years, averaging roughly one new parody every other day3.

The first-ever Clip Art Cover was a recreation of Nirvana's *Nevermind*, an album that had topped the Billboard 200 in January 1992 after replacing Michael Jackson's *Dangerous* at number one2.

The blog's creator seemed motivated partly by the reactions they got from designers horrified by Comic Sans usage, once posting about how comments like "it's worse than a demon, it's... COMIC SANS" made the whole project worthwhile1.

The Pokémon Blue clip art cover was the single most viral individual post in the trend's history, pulling 19,200+ Tumblr notes in three days3.

The NeoGAF clip art thread got more than 380 responses in a single day, making it one of the forum's most active threads that week3.

Derivatives & Variations

Video Game Box Art Variants

— The original album focus expanded to game covers, with *BioShock*, *Pokémon Blue*, and *Mass Effect 2* among popular targets[3].

DVD and Film Poster Versions

— Facepunch Forums users extended the format to movie and TV covers alongside albums and games[3].

Tumblr #clipart Tag Community

— Beyond the original blog, users posted their own clip art recreations under the #clipart hashtag on Tumblr[3].

Frequently Asked Questions

References (4)

  1. 1
    Clipart Coversarticle
  2. 2
    Album Art Meme - Know Your Memeencyclopedia
  3. 3
    Brat (internet meme)encyclopedia
  4. 4
    Nevermindencyclopedia