Graphic Art Designers Who Did Work for Thomas Kinkade
Thomas Kinkade, Artist to Mass Market place, Dies at 54
Thomas Kinkade, the prolific painter of bucolic and idealized scenes who estimated that his mass-produced works hung in one out of 20 American homes, died on Friday at his home in Los Gatos, Calif. He was 54.
He appeared to have died of natural causes, according to a statement that his family issued to The San Jose Mercury News.
Though often disdained by the fine art establishment, Mr. Kinkade built a decorative art empire by creating sentimental paintings that were, for the well-nigh part, relatively cheap and resonated with the desires of homeowners who did not ordinarily buy art. He sold his work straight, through his own franchise galleries or on cable television home shopping networks, and eventually online.
Much of his work reflected Christian themes or visions of a traditional, rustic America residing in comforting solitude. The paintings — of homey cottages and rural churches and rivers flowing gently through bright foliage — rarely included people, which allowed the owners to project themselves into the scenes.
Mr. Kinkade referred to himself as the "painter of low-cal," usually with a trademark symbol, for naturalistic scenes with highlights that appeared to glow. Often his canvases were mass-produced prints to which he added pocket-sized, brightly toned details. He made no apologies for commercializing the art field, comparing himself to million-sellers in, say, music and literature.
Occasionally, Mr. Kinkade presented well-known urban places, similar the Rockefeller Center skating rink and Indianapolis Motor Speedway. When Gene Monahan, the longtime trainer for the Yankees, retired last year, the team gave him a Kinkade portrait of the one-time Yankee Stadium.
Mr. Kinkade grew up in Placerville in Northern California and was raised in relative poverty by a single female parent. He said that he was drawn to art at a young age. As a beau, co-ordinate to The Associated Press, Mr. Kinkade traversed the land by boxcar with another artist, James Gurney, to sketch the American landscapes that they encountered.
He studied briefly at the University of California at Berkeley and the Fine art Heart Higher of Blueprint in Pasadena, earlier moving to Hollywood to pigment backgrounds for an blithe motion picture chosen "Fire and Water ice."
In the 1980s, Mr. Kinkade said, he became a born-over again Christian. The change dovetailed with a shift in his career path. Rebelling against what he considered the elitism of modern art, Mr. Kinkade moved his focus to retail, not a traditional gallery system. He began publishing inexpensive prints of his piece of work and, later, opened his own galleries.
"I view art as an inspirational tool," he told The New York Times in 2001. "People who put my paintings on their walls are putting their values on their walls: faith, family, domicile, a simpler way of living, the beauty of nature, placidity, tranquility, peace, joy, hope. They beckon you into this world that provides an alternative to your nightly news broadcast."
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In the late 1990s, Mr. Kinkade broadened his popular reach past licensing his proper noun to dozens of companies, like Avon and La-Z-Male child, to produce Thomas Kinkade lines of home effects. Just some other borderland remained: building the homes themselves.
He presently began fashioning gated communities in California, with houses and grounds in the likeness of his paintings.
"When Walt looked out over his citrus grove and envisioned Disneyland, it wasn't real to him all the same," Mr. Kinkade said, speaking every bit a Thomas Kinkade Community opened in Vallejo, Calif. "When he walked downward Primary Street it became real. And then this is that moment for me."
The homes were available then at a starting price of $425,000.
A decade ago, Mr. Kinkade's Media Arts Grouping, one time a publicly traded company, took in $32 million per quarter from 4,500 dealers beyond the country, according to The Mercury News. His paintings ranged in price from hundreds of dollars to more than $10,000.
His works were reproduced in books and on posters, canvas prints, manus-signed lithographs and collector'due south plates. He likened himself to Norman Rockwell and Walt Disney, insofar as all three "actually like to make people happy," he once said. Many of Mr. Kinkade's paintings captured scenes from Disney.
Mr. Kinkade thought himself to be the nation'south most collected living artist, with sales for his works and associated products approaching $100 1000000 annually.
He as well published books, including "Masterworks of Light" and "The Artist'southward Guide to Sketching," which he wrote with Mr. Gurney, that became best-sellers.
After news of his death spread on Saturday, fans and critics akin remembered him on Twitter for his seemingly ubiquitous paintings that they knew from the living rooms of grandparents and the waiting rooms of doctors' offices.
"Rest in peace, Thomas Kinkade. May your afterlife exist equally beautiful equally your art," 1 person wrote.
Another called Mr. Kinkade "a groovy mass-marketer," adding, "whether or not fine art should be mass-marketed is another discussion."
Even so even as he became wealthy, Mr. Kinkade said his work retained a simple, authentic aim. "People are reminded," he said, "that information technology's not all ugliness in the world."
He was survived by his wife, Nanette, and four children.
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Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/08/arts/design/thomas-kinkade-artist-to-mass-market-dies-at-54.html
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