I'm sorry for his family's loss, and my hat's off to the man for knowing how to make a living honorably. He was smart. He knew his customer and catered to their lowest common denominator tastes.
Posted on 04/06/2012 8:34:22 PM PDT by Free ThinkerNY
Thomas Kinkade, the "Painter of Light" and one of most popular artists in America, died suddenly Friday at his Los Gatos home. He was 54.
His family said in a statement that his death appeared to be from natural causes.
"Thom provided a wonderful life for his family,'' his wife, Nanette, said in a statement. "We are shocked and saddened by his death.''
His paintings are hanging in an estimated 1 of every 20 homes in the United States. Fans cite the warm, familiar feeling of his mass-produced works of art, while it has become fashionable for art critics to dismiss his pieces as tacky. In any event, his prints of idyllic cottages and bucolic garden gates helped establish a brand -- famed for their painted high lights -- not commonly seen in the art world.
"I'm a warrior for light," Kinkade told the Mercury News in 2002, alluding not just to his technical skill at creating light on canvas but to the medieval practice of using light to symbolize the divine. "With whatever talent and resources I have, I'm trying to bring light to penetrate the darkness many people feel."
(Excerpt) Read more at mercurynews.com ...
Good one.
Some one said, an anonymous source said, a friend said.
Give me a break.
But why did YOU bother to look that up and post it upon learning of his death?
I think you are vapid and sophomoric.
His art was beautiful. If it makes you stop and pause for a second in life and take in your breath, I don’t hardly call that vapid (without life) or sophomoric.
Your comment was though.
Sad the way the trolls posted nonsensical items in his actual art, so others would be deceived.
Oh that’s right he painted churches and calming scenes of beauty.
That brings out the leftist Obama hatred.
I'm sorry for his family's loss, and my hat's off to the man for knowing how to make a living honorably. He was smart. He knew his customer and catered to their lowest common denominator tastes.
He would never have been invited to membership in this group.
I appreciate your post. Everyone can be a critic. I’ve taken art classes over the years, as much to pull my mind out of my left brained profession as anything and at least with art I don’t have to worry about punishing those who live with me as I do if I play the piano or sing ((I have lived with musicians all my adult life). I am proud of some pencil drawings I’ve done of old family photos. I had them framed and there they hang in the spare bedroom. But I know that they aren’t great works of art. What they did was help me understand a bit the process of creating art. I do agree with other people who have posted that many truly great artists are a bit to a lot nuts. Many have mental health issues and addictive personalities. It sounds like Thomas did and that may be what led to his early death. I don’t have any paintings but I do have a little Christmas music box with his name slapped on it. It reminds me of a little cardboard and glitter church that was under the Christmas tree when I was a child. I think that’s what artists like Norman Rockwell and Thomas Kinkade did, remind of us of our childhood.
I love this thread - thanks for the link.
My two cents worth: good art is what you like; great art is what endures.
Same way with music. We’ve got a radio station in the Chicago area that plays a terrific selection of (what I consider) good, listenable music - the classier 70’s/80’s stuff - more Steely Dan than you hear on most stations, as an example. One of their tag lines is something like “the greatest music ever made”.
Well, 200 years from now people will still be listening to Bach and Mozart, and probably Joplin and Ellington. Becker and Fagen? Maybe, but I wouldn’t dare to venture that as a certainty.
If individuals like Kinkade, that’s fine, and by that standard, he’s good. Will anybody care about him in 200 years? Now that’s another question.
And in the context of your post, I have a feeling that if somebody slipped a lesser work by Munsch or Chagall in that gallery at your link, 98% of the viewers wouldn’t notice. Yet most would agree that Munsch and Chagall are great artists.
Or maybe we’ll have to wait another 100 years or so to be sure.
Nicely stated.
The 32 members of the group will be submitting up to four paintings between now and July.The show and sale in August is our major event for fundraising.
I try not to be too commercial in promoting this non profit. Once in a while a window opens.
"Ribera; Vermeer; Georges de La Tour and Rembrandt could never have existed without him; And Delacroix; Courbet and Manet would have been utterly different" Roberto Longhi.
The artist Caravaggio had a profound influence on figurative painting. He was a rebel who shocked the established art world with every painting. His use of prostitutes for models of Mary and his depiction of saints in common dress outraged the church. He even killed a man over a tennis match. His life was short and he died in exile. After his death, his detractors attributed lesser paintings to him and many of his greatest works were claimed by other artists. Even today, mystery and controversy surround him and his work but there is no denying his amazing talent.
The dramatic lighting is the first thing I notice when I see a Caravaggio. Well before Rembrandt, he used a nearly black background to emphasize the figures and lead the viewer into the story of each painting. The Calling of Saint Matthew is one of his earlier works. Although a complicated composition, Caravaggio leads us right to the center of interest. The shadow on the wall, the three accusing fingers and the sword of the seated man, all point to the seated Saint Matthew forming a triangle. He uses this device throughout his work. In the Crucifixion of Saint Peter, I count seven triangle shapes. You can probably find more.
Foreshortening is another favorite technique of Caravaggio. The seated figure in the center of the Calling of Saint Matthew, with his back to us, could have cut the painting in half but the use of the foreshortened legs directs my eye back into the painting. The foreshortened hand of Christ in Supper at Emmaus, grabs my attention.
One last element that makes Caravaggio's paintings so intense, is the direction of the observer's gaze. In Supper at Emmaus even the barmaid and server direct me with their gaze. All eyes lead to Christ. I especially love the gaze play in the Calling of Saint Matthew, at the top. The seated men at the table are looking at the standing men who are pointing to Saint Matthew. I don't know any other painter who directs the eye so well.
Sharon Weaver
I was just playin’ around.
Seriously, my wife loves Kinkade’s work. It seems to me his work is to the art world what pop (i.e., Britney Spears) is to the music world.
He was a huckster who sold “collectibles” that in reality were worth a fraction of what he was selling them for.
My wife bought some of his prints along with several figurines. She didn’t buy them for their “collectible” status as an investment. She bought them because she enjoyed looking at them and wanted to use them to decorate our home.
As for value, an item’s value is what someone is willing to pay.
...before charging $1500. Its resale value is about $250 and that’s including the frame.
My wife found his stuff for a lot less than $1500. I’m sure she even beat $250.
Doesn’t surprise me. He’d show up at the salon sweating heavily for no apparent reason & smelling like a distillery.
***Never, never, never buy something called a ‘collectible’ anything!***
I wish I could get that through my wife’s head about her “collectable” dolls.
Several years ago a man I worked with wanted me to do a copy of a Kinkade painting for his wife. Less than half way through I begged off claiming “copyright” laws prevented me from doing it. Actually I could not stand to look at the painting.
***As always, the liberals who root for the masses on the sidelines are snobbish elite.***
Forty years ago there was a popular artist whose work was everywhere. The Libs hated his work so bad they constantly derided it. The Artist said it made him so sad to be savaged by the critics that he cried every time he went to the bank to make a deposit. ;-D
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