Thomas Kinkade

Thomas Kinkade (born 1958) is an American painter most widely known for his mass-produced prints. He is marketed as the "Painter of Light", a phrase he has trademarked. His prints and paintings are distinguished by their glowing, 'overblown', highlights and vibrant pastel colors. Rendered in a faux impressionist style cross-pollinated with American Scene Painting values, his works often portray bucolic, idyllic settings such as gardens, streams, stone cottages and Main Streets. He has also depicted various Christian themes including the Holy Cross and churches.

Kinkade claims to be placing emphasis on the value of simple pleasures and that his intent is to communicate inspirational, life-affirming messages through his work. A self-described "devout Christian", Kinkade has said he gains his inspiration from his religious beliefs and that his work is intended to contain a larger moral dimension.

Kinkade is reportedly America's most-collected living artist.[1] Despite this he is often criticized for the extent to which he has commercialized his art, for example selling his prints on the QVC home shopping network. Others have complained that his paintings, while pretty, are without substance.

Biography

Kinkade grew up in the small town of Placerville, California, and obtained higher education at the University of California at Berkeley and the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena. In 1982, he married his childhood sweetheart, Nanette.

He spent a summer on a sketching tour with a college friend, producing a popular instructional book, The Artist's Guide to Sketching. The success of the book landed the two young artists at Ralph Bakshi Studios creating background art for the 1983 animated feature film Fire and Ice. While working on the film, Kinkade began to explore the depiction of light and of imagined worlds. After the film, Kinkade earned his living as a painter, selling his originals in galleries throughout California.

His works are sold by mail order and in dedicated retail outlets as high-quality prints, often using texturizing techniques on real canvas to make the surface of the finished prints mimic the raised surface of the original painting. His images are also used extensively on other merchandise such as calendars and greetings cards.

The paintings are the excellent portrayal of the events and scenes that we see around us. The painters are the best cameras of the world. They reproduce many different types of pictures. They even draw imaginary pictures that do not exist in this world. We tend to use both thinned oil paints and dense oil paints. Masterpieces can be dyed more than once, but each time it may be different from the existing paintings.h

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