Fantasy Painting Object Labeling

Confirmed 167,167

Part of a series on Object Labeling. [View Related Entries]

About

Fantasy Painting Object Labeling refers to a series of Object Labeling image macros in which a piece of artwork, usually depicting a giant monster in battle with a small person or creature, is labeled to humorously depict everyday actions or emotions.

Origin

While the origin of labeling fantastical artworks for humorous purposes is unclear, one of the earliest known posts to use the format was posted December 26th, 2017 by Facebook user Thin Lizzy.^[1] They labeled the giant skeleton in the painting "Nightcrawler" by Boris Groh as "me at 3 am" and the person in the painting "shredded cheese from the bag." The post gained over 1,3000 likes (shown below).

Spread

The trend began seeing momentum in late January 2018. Several of these types of images were created by Instagram user youngbottomtext; their first, posted January 20th, 2018,^[2] shows a giant labeled "me at 3 am" and a small person labeled "my meat." The post gained 844 likes (shown below). Many of the images posted by youngbottomtext are edited versions of paintings by Instagram artist mr_werewolf.^[3]^[4]

Meanwhile, popular edits were posted on several different platforms. For example, on Tumblr, a Goth GF joke posted by funke^[5] on January 27th, gained over 24,000 notes (shown below, left). On January 29th, a Mesothelioma Ad Copypasta joke was posted to /r/dankmemes^[6] where it gained over 7,300 upvotes (shown below, right).

On January 28th, 2018, PewDiePie uploaded a video^[7] in which he discussed the meme, saying he did not know the name but he brought up several examples. The video gained over 4.2 million views.