Thomas Kinkade, Painter Of Crap, Must Pay $2.1 Million To Former Gallery Owners
Thomas Kinkade calls himself the "Painter of Light," and allegedly uses his "faith" to lure in investors to his gallery business. Now two former gallery owners have won a judgment from Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that forces Kinkade to abide by a 2007 arbitration decision that awarded the former owners $860,000 in damages and more than $1.2 million in attorneys' fees and arbitration expenses. Ouchy.
From the San Francisco Chronicle:
In its February 2006 decision, the arbitration panel said Kinkade and other company officials used terms like "partner," "trust," "Christian" and "God" to create "a certain religious environment designed to instill a special relationship of trust" with the couple.
What the company didn't tell them, said their attorney, was that they would have to sell Kinkade's works at minimum retail prices while the artist undercut them with discount sales, some of which he made himself on cable television.
It was part of a plan, they claimed, to lower the value of the publicly traded company before Kinkade bought it in 2004, at steep losses to many investors. Hazlewood and Spinello put their $122,000 savings into galleries in Charlottesville and Fredericksburg, Va., that opened in 1999 and 2000 and closed in 2003.
Kinkade's company denies everything. "We are confident that before this is over, we'll be vindicated," said a lawyer for the firm.
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Comments:
Oooh, death match between arbitration and Thomas Kinkade! I can't pick which is worse.
Kinkade is the biggest fraud ever. He has his students paint his work and he just signs the bottom. Fuc*ing liar!
And by "faith" he means, "When I read the moneychangers-in-the-temple story, I totally came down on the side of the moneychangers!"
My fiance's mother was in a gallery and started ranting about how it was all worthless trash paintings. She didn't realize the Ole Tom was standing right next to her.
Some day I'm going to start a business that sells Jesus-themed pornography, thereby combining America's two greatest obsessions...
@Alex Chasick: Kinkade, definitely Kinkade. My kitty's poop has more inherent art than his ... well, let's call it "work".
@Alex Chasick: Is there an arbitration charm bracelet? [www.collectiblestoday.com]
Arbitration snow globe?
I rest my case.
@chazcarr: I would much rather hang a velvet Elvis on my wall than anything Thomas Kinkade (or more likely one of his "assistants") crapped out.
Kinkade better start painting more crap if he wants to pay off this settlement!
What is this appealing arbitration?? Is it only binding if it finds in favor of the big guys??
Where's my broom......
Why term him "Painter of Crap" when you can get the rhyme with "Painter of Shite"?
@HIV 2 Elway: As did Warhol and Dali for that matter... in fact, most experts agree that Leonardo's "Virgin of the Rocks" was probably painted by an apprentice.
@doctor_cos: Kinkade filed suit in District Court trying to block the arbitrators decision -- which he won. The appeals court reversed that decision and affirmed the arbitrators.
I'm not a fan of his work by any means, but plenty of people definitely are. It's a little puerile to call him the "painter of crap," and besides, he's a marketer, not an artist. And obviously a darn good one.
Thomas Kinkade is to art as Booth was to Lincoln.
@HIV 2 Elway: Difference being, they are both capable of "producing" some great works. If you've ever seen a BIG Chihuly installation, it's pretty impressive, love it or hate it.
@teknowaffle: I would have LOL'd. It's fun challenging the artist's work, especially to their face. If you can't argue the value of your work to somebody, maybe it doesn't have value after all.
Personally I think his work is from a completely different, grossly naive universe, but it is not without value; if it had been painted a couple centuries ago, it would have been regarded extremely well. The art "culture" in our society is just a ravenous beast consuming novelty and regurgitating hideous caricatures of itself.
@HIV 2 Elway: Koons (who does puerile, middlebrow-"shocking" crap) doesn't pretend to do anything else; he even celebrates the Factoryness of his assembly line. Same with Warhol.
Kinkade tried to hide it. Big difference.
Prominent, faith-on-his-sleeve Christian turns out to be a shyster? Color me not surprised.
@amandaramirez: It isn't that his students paint his work-- this kind of apprenticeship has been known since the birth of art. It is that his 'paintings' aren't actually real works, they are recreations of works printed on canvas with a treatment to make them look painted. A student might go in and add a little detail here or there with actual paint, but they are NOT originals. Another group of gallery artists in my hometown area sued him for that-- they were not, by contract, allowed to put works on sale and the reason as they were direct distributors and no one else would get any Kincaid work like what they could sell the public. Fastforward a couple of months, they found that Kincaid was selling work to other retailers, thus violating the agreement... even finding Kincaid works they had in stock at TJ Maxx. They got suing mad.
@teknowaffle: I live in his home town and bite my tongue every time I walk past that "gallery". I'm always worried he or a rabid fan is right next to me.
The Placerville gallery is spooky too, just like a mortuary.
I'm not surprised, either--copyrighted materials published at one of my Web sites has been, uh, "appropriated" by a so-called Christian author in a book published last fall.
Her print book looks so much like my own stuff, it turned my hair white. I'm not just talking "concept", but the entire layout, color scheme, format and style just happened to pop up in this 2008 book.
Of course, her "Christian" publisher is the same outfit that brought us Jamie Lynn Spears' faith-based parenting manual, so go figure.
Ironically, I both knew him from church and went to school with his daughters.
@RecordStoreToughGuy: He basically made a grunting noise and walked away. One intelligent person in a store filled who is against his crap is outweighed by the fawning, tasteless middle class fans.
@Duke_Newcombe: I rarely if ever see any bashing here of people who truly live according to Christian values. It's the people who feed off of the church business and its "faith-based" offshoots that receive the well-deserved bashing.
@Nicole Jordan: Yeah, he's a pretty easy target for snarkiness. Look at his product line, the licensed products and partners and such -- impressive merchandising indeed.
I LOVE Thomas Kincaid's (or whoever actually did them's) paintings! Not that I'd ever buy one, but I do try to get his desk calendar for 1/2 off after each New Year's.
Shady dealings from another 'faith-based' businessman doesn't surprise me though.
I recall watching a news feature story on Thomas Kinkaid several years ago, where he said something like, "Me and my wife pray over every painting."
Then soon after that, one of my subordinates showed me a TK painting that was printed on a sofa throw she'd just purchased, and she bragged about all of the TK paintings she'd collected. Apparently people collect them like Hummel figurines or something.
@razremytuxbuddy: I agree, as a Christian I don't think it's wrong to make money for a living (even if it's disgusting art) - but when you do it in a fraudulent, illegal, or unethical way, it hurts or misleads people and should be bashed!
@Shoelace: I don't really see what difference "faith-based" business and normal business should have in reality.
Normal business should possess integrity, generosity, honesty, and courtesy. When those and other qualities are present in business transactions, everyone wins and everyone is happy.
To me (a Christian), there is "good business" as above, and "bad business", where the opposite is true (extortion, misleading, lying, rudeness). I guess I don't see the need for the qualification. The "faith" part is what happens *after* you get the money anyway.
I like his work. Much better artistry than a lot of artists such as Warhol. Some people hate ANYTHING that is even remotely related to Christianity because it thrashes against Aethism, agnostism and evolution. And lets be honest, inet people seem to be the later.
@GuinevereRucker: I think I see what you mean, but some businesspeople present themselves as religious just to draw in business and/or to help them look credible. Bad business is bad whether or not the proprietor is claiming to be faith-based, but the additional level of lying and hypocrisy of a 'faith-based' businessperson who turns out to be unethical or a criminal (vs. someone who doesn't present as though their soul is at stake) really irks.
His work is much like the Velvet Elvis they sell at gas stations on holidays. I do not understand how people thought they could have a succesful business selling only one artists "works".