# RIP Thomas Kinkade **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 7, 2012, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058 "2012-04-07T03:21:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2012, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058/81 "2012-04-07T21:24:40Z")
I do have to give him credit for achieving a nigh-impossible artistic accomplishment, something that no other artist in history has managed: He gets all other artists in the world to agree on something. I mean, that had to take a lot of talent to pull off, right? ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2012, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058/82 "2012-04-07T21:36:43Z")
I am thoroughly enjoying the _NY Times_ obit; they are not usually known for their humor, but: > [@](#): > > After news of his death spread on Saturday, fans and critics alike remembered him on Twitter . . . “Rest in peace, Thomas Kinkade. May your afterlife be as beautiful as your art,” one person wrote. Is that a subtle way of saying “Go to hell?” and > [@](#): > > Mr. Kinkade built a decorative art empire by creating sentimental paintings that were, for the most part, relatively inexpensive and resonated with the desires of homeowners who did not ordinarily buy art . . . fans and critics alike remembered him for his seemingly ubiquitous paintings that they knew from the living rooms of grandparents and the waiting rooms of doctors’ offices. Oh, _snap!_ A nicer way of saying “people who furnish their homes from Harriet Carter catalogs.” ---
**Author:** ![Jenaroph](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e8c25b/32.png) [@Jenaroph](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jenaroph)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2012, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058/83 "2012-04-07T21:47:24Z")
> [@Eve](#): > > I know what it is: his landscapes look like someone did a pointillist version of Maxfield Parrish, only instead of using dabs of paint, like Seurat, they used Peeps. Awesome description. For a more technical analysis of why Kinkade’s paintings are crap, there’s [this blog post](http://www.ncregister.com/blog/simcha-fisher/whats-so-bad-about-thomas-kinkade). Buried in that post is link to [another essay,](http://www.firstthings.com/onthesquare/2010/06/thomas-kinkadersquos-cottage-fantasy) which compares some of his older, better art to the junk he started putting out later. The guy had some talent, and chose to paint garbage instead. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2012, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058/84 "2012-04-07T22:37:39Z")
If you combine elements of Norman Rockwell, _The Stepford Wives_, _1984_, and _The Twilight Zone_ (“It’s _good_ that he paints this way! Very Very good!”), you end up with Thomas Kinkade. He is (was) the Kirk Cameron of fine art. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2012, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058/85 "2012-04-07T22:51:54Z")
> [@](#): > > …and The Twilight Zone (“It’s good that he paints this way! Very Very good!”) Aside: It bugs me when people refer to that as a Twilight Zone reference, since the original short story was already one of the great classics of science fiction, and now seems almost forgotten in the shadow of the TV adaptation. ---
**Author:** ![fessie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c37758/32.png) [@fessie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fessie)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2012, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058/86 "2012-04-07T23:02:53Z")
What was frustrating to me about Kinkade was that he was able to make claims of artistic proficiency that were difficult to refute because his images were recognizable, and to a lot of people THAT is the point of art. To artists, it isn’t. Artists know successful art has elements that work together - in a representational landscape, for example, the shadows and the highlights “lock”. They command, they express space, they work together. Change an element and the weight of the piece changes. Kinkade’s elements were random and meaningless, in terms of how he used color and form - they bore no relationship to each other. But because the roofs were brown and the skies were blue, people thought that was good enough. Campy is fine; treacly is fine, too. Just don’t pass it off as “outstanding.” That’s a lie. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2012, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058/87 "2012-04-07T23:05:33Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Aside: It bugs me when people refer to that as a Twilight Zone reference, since the original short story was already one of the great classics of science fiction, and now seems almost forgotten in the shadow of the TV adaptation. _The Twilight Zone_ is the Thomas Kinkade of science fiction. ---
**Author:** ![Balance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ccd318/32.png) [@Balance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balance)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2012, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058/88 "2012-04-07T23:30:46Z")
> [@Eve](#): > > Is that a subtle way of saying “Go to hell?” If I believed in an afterlife, I would hope that he would find one where the light was always the perfect color and at just the proper angle. I will leave it as an exercise for the reader to determine whether such a place would be Kinkade’s Heaven or his Hell. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2012, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058/89 "2012-04-07T23:37:09Z")
New Flash! Another Circle of Hell has just been discovered – the one where you are surrounded by Thomas Kinkade paintings for eternity, and your arms are paralyzed so you are unable to gouge your own eyes out. ---
**Author:** ![gaffa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e68b1a/32.png) [@gaffa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gaffa)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2012, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058/90 "2012-04-07T23:47:37Z")
> [@freckafree](#): > > Do tell! > > Thanks, **gaffa** , for providing the link to the Susan Orleans article. I have looked for it often since having read it in the New Yorker in 2001. You’re welcome. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Hamster\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8edcca/32.png) [@The\_Hamster\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Hamster_King)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2012, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058/91 "2012-04-08T01:04:21Z")
> [@living\_in\_hell](#): > > What say you? Is he an artist? Sure he was an artist. Just a crappy one. I love _Norman Rockwell_, and I still think Kinkade’s paintings are shit. ---
**Author:** ![Frank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Frank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2012, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058/92 "2012-04-08T01:11:54Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Aside: It bugs me when people refer to that as a Twilight Zone reference, since the original short story was already one of the great classics of science fiction, and now seems almost forgotten in the shadow of the TV adaptation. That’s a _good_ thing. ---
**Author:** ![gaffa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e68b1a/32.png) [@gaffa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gaffa)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2012, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058/93 "2012-04-08T01:19:12Z")
Susan Orleans was a guest on MSNBC’s _Weekends With Alex Witt_ today talking about Kinkade. She said she had a million dollar bet with him that he proposed and took completely seriously - that he would would be vindicated and that there would be a show of his work in a major museum in his lifetime. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2012, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058/94 "2012-04-08T01:20:53Z")
> [@Eve](#): > > Is that a subtle way of saying “Go to hell?” I “liked” a FB post that said pretty much this, thinking it was ironic. On second read, I don’t think the thing I read was! :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2012, 1:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058/95 "2012-04-08T01:22:21Z")
I answered no: somewhere I have a calendar of Kincade wannabes, but they’re not by him. I actually like them better than his real stuff. May I add another comparison? Thomas Kincade was the Lady Gaga of painting: he had talent, he just chose not to use it. ---
**Author:** ![not\_what\_you\_d\_expect](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_what_you_d_expect/32/3246_2.png) [@not\_what\_you\_d\_expect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_what_you_d_expect)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2012, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058/96 "2012-04-08T01:28:17Z")
His gallery in Placerville is about 30 seconds away from our new deli, so we visited it today. They were selling paintings like crazy. I did see a print of a tree with pink leaves that wasn’t too bad. Another landscape one sort of attracted me until I realized it was Jesus walking in the park. He had some issues with alcohol, I believe. 54 is too young. May he RIP. ---
**Author:** ![Sarabellum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sarabellum/32/3492_2.png) [@Sarabellum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sarabellum)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2012, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058/97 "2012-04-08T01:40:04Z")
My former MIL dropped thousands of dollars on Kinkade prints. She used them as focal points for her interior design, to nauseating effect. I’m sure her Thomas Kinkade purchase history balances out fifty other Kinkade-hating households. She is a sweet, otherwise fairly intelligent lady, but those paintings! Ugh! Always the ones of the garden cottages, too. Way too much treacle for this atheist. Painter of Shite. Do people feel sort of the same way about that Hawaiian marine life painter by the name of Christian Riese Lassen? At one point, I remember the Lassen guy was getting really over commercialized, and had little mall-based “galleries” the way Kinkade did. People were paying thousands for these horrid little paintings of whale-tails and such. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2012, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058/98 "2012-04-08T01:49:27Z")
> [@Sarabellum1976](#): > > … > Do people feel sort of the same way about that Hawaiian marine life painter by the name of Christian Riese Lassen? At one point, I remember the Lassen guy was getting really over commercialized, and had little mall-based “galleries” the way Kinkade did. People were paying thousands for these horrid little paintings of whale-tails and such. Never heard of him, so I’m not contemptuous of his art… yet. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2012, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058/99 "2012-04-08T01:51:33Z")
Thing is, even Norman Rockwell would do serious subjects (remember his painting of the little black girl walking to school with n-word scrawled on the wall?). Kinkade just did technicolored shit. It looked like my dog’s turd after she ate crayons. > [@Boyo\_Jim](#): > > New Flash! Another Circle of Hell has just been discovered – the one where you are surrounded by Thomas Kinkade paintings for eternity, and your arms are paralyzed so you are unable to gouge your own eyes out. Nor can you blink. > [@sparky\_1](#): > > Something Awful had pretty funny examples of satirical [Kinkades](http://www.somethingawful.com/d/photoshop-phriday/paintings-light-part.php). > > I don’t own any, and only know of one person who did. To me, they always seemed cartoonish (I remember visiting a Kinkade gallery with that person). They did a [follow-up](http://www.somethingawful.com/d/photoshop-phriday/paintings-light-ii.php?page=1). God bless SA. > [@Jettboy](#): > > Now when I get together with other artists who will we ridicule, deride and bust on? I guess now that Kinkade print I was going to use as toilet paper will cost me a small fortune. [You’re in luck.](http://images.somethingawful.com/inserts/articlepics/photoshop/01-16-04-kinkade/Kanzune2.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2012, 1:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058/100 "2012-04-08T01:53:39Z")
> [@Sarabellum1976](#): > > …Do people feel sort of the same way about that Hawaiian marine life painter by the name of Christian Riese Lassen? At one point, I remember the Lassen guy was getting really over commercialized, and had little mall-based “galleries” the way Kinkade did. People were paying thousands for these horrid little paintings of whale-tails and such. Ok. I Googled him and looked at a bunch of his paintings, and NOW I’m contemptuous of him. He’s the Thomas Kinkade of Sea World. Though I do kind of like some of his portraits of Flipper. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rip-thomas-kinkade/618058.md?page=6)