OT: Thomas Kinkade recent article from Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Jen Nance, Slave of Versace and Yamamoto.
pictures for the following article. The article is from SATURDAY November
13 and will probably NOT be on the web site for too many more days. Hit the
art/life link at the seattlep-i.com web site if the address that I have
provided above gives you any problems.
-------------------------------------
Here's the article in text. I have no mercy and I cut and pasted it for the
Kincade fans at this NG without asking for Tessa DeCarlo's permission. Oh,
welllll....
Kinkade provides art for the soul
The critics may sneer, but multimillionaire artist has won the hearts of
the people
Saturday, November 13, 1999
By TESSA DeCARLO
THE NEW YORK TIMES
SAN JOSE, Calif. -- Thomas Kinkade's 100,000-square-foot headquarters here
is hardly a typical artist's atelier. But then Kinkade, arguably the most
commercially successful painter of the 1990s, is hardly a typical artist.
In a large room lined with industrial sinks, dozens of workers in aprons
and galoshes dunk reproductions of Kinkade's latest painting in water, peel
off the paper backing and glue the flower-and-sunbeam-spangled landscape to
stretched canvas. Down the hall, another room is filled with workers
sitting before long rows of the canvas-backed reproductions, amplifying the
picture's luminescent light effects by adding dots and squiggles of paint.
<Picture: Photo> Kinkade In a smaller studio nearby, three "master
highlighters" trained personally by Kinkade do the same thing with more
finesse and a wider range of colors. And in the vast warehouse out back,
hundreds more people mat, frame, pack and ship the finished pictures to the
248 Thomas Kinkade galleries in malls and tourist Meccas all over the
United States, where they'll be sold to eager collectors for anywhere from
$600 to $10,000 and up.
Welcome to the future according to Kinkade. Welcome to a crusade to redeem
the soul of American art.
"I represent the forefront of an entirely new trend, a populist movement
that takes images people understand and creates an iconography for our
era," says Kinkade, an ebullient, burly, mustached fellow in jeans who
looks more like a construction worker than a multimillionaire artist. "We
are creating an avalanche of imagery that is impacting the world."
For most high-art aficionados, Kinkade's light-dappled renderings of
frothing oceans, fantastical cottages and feverishly colorful gardens,
bearing titles like "The Blessings of Spring" and "Hometown Evening," may
be impossible to see as anything but slickly commercial kitsch. But in view
of Kinkade's popularity -- his official Web site calls him America's most
collected living artist -- we might pause before dismissing his paintings
out of hand.
After all, these days the line between kitsch and serious art is blurring,
thanks to the art world's reflexive disdain for boundaries and its
insatiable appetite for new ways to shock. It's a trend epitomized by the
apotheosis of Norman Rockwell from kitsch illustrator to member of the
high-art canon, as signaled by the big Rockwell retrospective that opened
last weekend at the High Museum in Atlanta and will arrive at the
Guggenheim in New York in 2001. With sweetness, sincerity and bad taste
seemingly in the ascendant, is a Kinkade show at the Guggenheim next?
Well, no. As yet Kinkade has no champions in the high-art world, not even
among those who endorse other popular antimodernists. For example, Robert
Rosenblum, as curator of the Guggenheim's Rockwell show, shrugs off the
outrage of art-world colleagues. "They're old fogies and they think it's
substandard art," he says. "I think of it as a cutting-edge experiment."
But even Rosenblum draws the line at Thomas Kinkade.
"Rockwells are interesting to look at because they're cultural documents
and because their narrative and visual construction is so fascinating," he
says. Kinkade's work, by contrast, strikes him as vapid and repetitive. "He
doesn't look like an artist who's worth considering, except in terms of
supply and demand. Of course a lot of people would have probably said the
same thing about Rockwell 20 or 30 years ago," Rosenblum adds. "But I think
Rockwell is different."
Naturally, Kinkade disagrees. "There have been three icon-makers in our
century," he says. Two, Maxfield Parrish and Norman Rockwell, were embraced
by the masses but disdained by critics until decades later. The third is
Kinkade himself. "Because my art is populist," he predicts, "it is likely
to be shunned until a curator or two steps to the front and says: 'We have
to look at this. This is art that is embraced wildly by our culture."' In
the meantime, he adds, "The critics may not endorse me, but I own the
hearts of the people."
Kinkade, 41, is a devout Christian whose life appears to be as rich in
sentiment as his pictures. He is married to his childhood sweetheart,
Nanette, and has four young daughters, Merritt, Chandler, Winsor and
Everett, all of whom share the middle name Christian. He grew up in the
California mountain town of Placerville, dropped out of both the University
of California at Berkeley and the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena,
bummed around the country and painted backgrounds for the animated film
"Fire and Ice" before becoming a gallery artist. From the beginning his
goals were very different from those of the high-art world.
For one thing, he wanted a large popular audience. For another, he believed
art's purpose is to provide inspiration and reassurance, not -- per
modernist orthodoxy -- to question assumptions or challenge the status quo.
"My paintings provide hope to people in despair, provide a reminder of the
beauty of God's creation despite the darkness surrounding our lives,"
Kinkade explains.
He calls painting his ministry and says he has received hundreds of letters
from grateful fans telling how his pictures have lifted their spirits,
reunited their families, even saved them from suicide.
<Picture: Photo> At the Thomas Kinkade Gallery in Westlake Mall, Beverly
Phillips of Silverdale views the artist's light-dappled landscapes, set off
by the dark walls and rheostat lights. Mike Urban/P-I To high-art types
Kinkade's sentimental belief in uplift is a key reason his work is so
unappealing. "It's about reaffirming images that are comfortable, which
isn't very interesting," says Gary Garrels, the chief curator at the San
Francisco Museum of Modern Art. "There's just very little to discuss
there."
To Kinkade such attitudes reveal the emotional poverty of the art elite.
"High culture is paranoid about sentiment," he says. "But human beings are
intensely sentimental. And if art does not speak a language that's
accessible to people, it relegates itself to obscurity."
Certainly he believes in making art accessible, in every sense. Many
popular artists sell limited-edition reproductions rather than original
paintings, but Kinkade has taken this strategy to previously unimagined
extremes.
His multitiered system includes basic paper prints costing a few hundred
dollars, "canvas lithographs" in "standard numbered" editions of 4,000 or
more that sell in the low four figures, pricier "Renaissance editions"
enhanced by "master highlighters" and a half-dozen other variations. At the
top are "semi-originals" highlighted by Kinkade himself that can cost
$34,000 or more.
In addition to having more dedicated galleries than any other artist, all
furnished with dark-green carpeted walls and rheostat lights to enhance his
pictures' crowd-pleasing light effects, Kinkade is also the only painter on
the New York Stock Exchange. Media Arts Group Inc., the publicly traded
company that distributes his work, posted $126 million in revenues and $84
million in profits for fiscal 1999, reflecting not only sales of Kinkade's
pictures but licensing agreements for Kinkade cards, puzzles, mugs,
blankets, books and even La-Z-Boy furniture.
According to the Media Arts spokeswoman, Brenda Balingit, "We believe it's
the first time a lifestyle brand has been built around an artist rather
than a clothing designer."
Local outlets
Thomas Kinkade's Media Arts Group says his works are sold at three dozen
galleries and shops in Washington state, including these in the greater
Seattle area:
•Thomas Kinkade Westlake Gallery, Seattle •Kenneth Behm Galleries Ltd.,
Bellevue •Heather House, Bothell •Redmond Town Center Gallery, Redmond
•Rosetree Cottage, Redmond •Promises to Keep, Woodinville •Victorian
Cottage, Maple Valley •Edmonds Fountain Gallery, Edmonds •Thomas Kinkadse
at Light of the World Galleries, Everett •Deck the Walls/Lynnwood, Lynnwood
•Tacoma Gallery, Tacoma •Tacoma Mall Gallery, Tacoma •Deck the
Walls/Kitsap, Silverdale •Bell Book & Candle, Port Orchard •Springhouse
Dolls & Gifts, Port Orchard •Front Street Gallery, Poulsbo •Queens Cabinet,
Poulsbo
© 1999 The New York Times.
All rights reserved.
<Picture: Headlines>
Kinkade provides art for the soul
Ganz's painterly grace raises the lowly to a heavenly place
Rare weaver brings her art to Burke celebration
Horsey sense
Frye Art Museum celebrates the cheery watercolors of Rie Muñoz
'Dusk' reveals somber theme with much wit
High-impact abstractions, clunky still lifes highlight November gallery
shows
------------------------------------------------------------------------
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© 1999 Seattle Post-Intelligencer.
All rights reserved.
--
There are no unachievable goals
There are no unsaveable souls
No legitimate kings or queens,
Do you know what I mean?
There are no unachievable goals
There are no unsaveable souls
No legitimate kings or queens,
Do you know what I mean?
There are no indisputable truths
And there ain't no fountain of youth
Each night when the day is through
I don't ask much, I just want YOU.
----Ozzy Osbourne
Hal Rand
"Jen Nance, Slave of Versace and Yamamoto." <J...@nwrain.com> wrote:
> Go to the web site www.seattlep-i.com/visualartkink13.shmtl to see the
> pictures for the following article. The article is from SATURDAY
November
> 13 and will probably NOT be on the web site for too many more days.
Hit the
> art/life link at the seattlep-i.com web site if the address that I
have
> provided above gives you any problems.
> -------------------------------------
>
> Here's the article in text. I have no mercy and I cut and pasted it
for the
> Kincade fans at this NG without asking for Tessa DeCarlo's permission.
Oh,
> welllll....
>
> Kinkade provides art for the soul
>
> The critics may sneer, but multimillionaire artist has won the hearts
of
> the people
>
> Saturday, November 13, 1999
>
> By TESSA DeCARLO
> THE NEW YORK TIMES
Thank You!! :-))
Hal
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.
Jen Nance, Slave of Versace and Yamamoto.
JN
--
SSJedi
Thanks for the article, JN.
Syndi
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