It comes rather out of the blue, especially because Julie Morstad’s art here obviously harkens to Mary Blair and mid-century illustration, rather than some notion of a single Etsy in-house illustration style.

Etsy is just a shopfront and selling platform, and there are many good illustrators, (fledgeling and professional) working in different mediums, methods, and with different sensibilities who use it to sell their work. I sell my work there, and many of my friends and peers do, all with totally different illustration styles. Established picture book illustrators, like Calef Brown and Sophie Blackall use it as well. Dismissing or casting suspicion on artists because they use a certain online shopfront is a bit baby-with-the-bathwater, don’t you think?

You wouldn’t declare thousands of drivers suspect just because they take the same model of car to work. Etsy is just a vehicle, and it’s the drivers (good, bad, or otherwise) who matter.