Issue date: Feb 6, 2000

In this article:
Kinkade defines a new Americana
Still it's a far cry from the life Kinkade knew

By Monika Guttman

OVE OVER, Martha Stewart. Make room, Norman Rockwell. At the dawn of a new millennium, the latest name to capture America's fancy -- and decorate its hearths and homes -- is a 42-year-old California family man named Thomas Kinkade.

Unknown only a few years ago, today Kinkade is considered the top-selling artist in America. In the past seven years, sales of Kinkade art, books and other merchandise racked up an incredible $700 million.

And while art critics dismiss the self-proclaimed "Painter of Light'' as a painter of lite, owners of the 10 million Kinkade pictures adorning the walls of America would surely disagree.

Kinkade proudly compares his popularity to that of a hit movie or country-music star. "I'm very excited," he says, "about allowing myself to become mainstream in the sense that people would have the same enjoyment of me that they do of a Walt Disney movie or a Garth Brooks piece of music." The average person lives with 40 walls, he notes -- "a big opportunity."

Unlike other titans of American art and design, Kinkade is little known outside his vast network of fans -- that is, to the media. He doesn't hang out in the Hamptons with Puffy Combs or get invited to state dinners at the White House (though he does have a company listed on the New York Stock Exchange). And his soft, fuzzy landscapes are found in malls, not museums.

But check out your neighbor's new La-Z-Boy by the TV. Kinkade may have designed the fabric. Or the landscape painting above the fireplace: It could be a Kinkade. Or the new gallery in town: It's probably one of 4,000 that carry Kinkade's work.

Kinkade defines a new Americana, shaped not by the latest issue of Martha Stewart Living or Architectural Digest, but by grass-roots popularity drawn to the message behind the merchandise. His glowing pictures of peaceful gardens, cheery houses and sentimental small towns, coupled with a strong Christian-family theme he expresses through a cottage industry of books, at a Web site and on home-shopping network QVC (and in advertisements such as those that appear in this magazine), combine old-fashioned hominess with a new quest for spirituality.

"As we start the new millennium, subconsciously I think we are looking back to a more peaceful era with cottages and small towns," says Sherry Ruggieri, host of House and Garden TV's Design Basics show. "His work is so articulated, we can almost smell the cookies baking."

The quiet Kinkade craze parallels another surge that took media types by surprise: Christian-based entertainment. Says Keith Perkins, managing editor of Art Business News, "I can't tell you how many artists have turned to religious-based art."

The result is explosive success for a painter whose work critics dismiss. Consider the following:

When Kinkade exchanged palette for pen last year, his advice book, Lightposts for Living: The Art of Choosing a Joyful Life, shot to the top of five best-seller lists. In addition to signature lines of furniture (La-Z-Boy chairs and sofas, outdoor furniture), lamps, wallpaper, plates, tapestries and pillows, Kinkade doesn't rule out the possibility of his own brand of fragrances and apparel. A major West Coast builder is designing a house to resemble the gray-and-yellow two-story home in Kinkade's painting Home Is Where the Heart Is, with an eye toward a possible "Kinkade Village." In the works: a daily radio minute, a syndicated newspaper column and another book. For collectors such as Michelle Parris-Ferrero, 31, an Orange County, Calif., investor-relations representative who has spent $33,000 on 27 Kinkades, his paintings are more than mere decoration. The soft images provide an "escape from reality," she says. "When I'm facing difficult decisions, I just lose myself in the pieces. People come to my house and say they find it very peaceful and tranquil. I know it's the Kinkade paintings." Kinkade, whose company stock alone is worth $15 million to $30 million, depending on the market, describes his work as "comfort art" -- with a message. He believes his pictures provide solace to people who view the world as "largely hopeless, largely confused and increasingly dark." "Every product I do is driven by the message that's the foundation of everything: home, family, faith in God, beauty of nature, a simpler way of living, hope and light," Kinkade says. On the Web, on QVC and in books, Kinkade is the painter prophet, expounding the virtue of God and family, pointing to his marriage of 17 years to Nanette and their daughters Merritt, 11, Chandler, 8, Windsor, 4, and Everett, 2 (all with the middle name Christian).

La-Z-Boy recliner: $699. One in a line of Kinkade chairs and sofas in 85 different fabrics. Bible cover: Slip-on tapestry in meduim, large and extra-larger. $26.95. Night light: Comes in six designs. $12.98.

"When he talks about his children, his family and when he was a boy, all that makes people feel closer to him, like they're becoming his friend when they buy his painting," says Debbie Gottlieb, director of collectibles merchandise at QVC, where Kinkades sell at the rate of $10,000 a minute, or $15 million a year.

Kinkades also are easy access, with many of his "Signature Galleries" in big shopping malls, at a time when consumers have both the money and the desire to redecorate.

Part of the brilliance of this Painter of Light is in the way his art is merchandised. Kinkade doesn't actually sell his original paintings (what single human could paint 10 million canvases?). Instead, he sells reproductions of his work, from $500 to as much as $25,000 for "master's editions'' that the artist himself "highlights."

Ivy Gate, his home in the coastal mountains of northern California, is modest compared to the spoils of many of today's Internet millionaires. The tree-laden setting where he lives and works is comfortable rather than grand. His studio is a remodeled 1930s cottage next to his house, and he takes time out each week to teach art to his daughters, who are home-schooled by Nanette and a nanny. Crayon drawings by the girls hang proudly beside originals by his idol, Norman Rockwell.

"Nanette and I still don't have aspirations of mansions or big, huge possessions," Kinkade says. In fact, he adds, they give away more than $1 million a year, to charities such as World Vision and his own new Thomas Kinkade Foundation.

Still it's a far cry from the life Kinkade knew as a child in rural Placerville, Calif. He lived "in the most rundown house in the neighborhood," he says. When his parents divorced, his mother struggled to support the family as a county clerk. From her, he says, he got his idealism and faith. "She'd always say, 'Kids, a miracle happened today' if she got extra work."

Kinkade started Lightpost Publishing a decade ago in his garage. Today, it's part of the larger Media Arts Group, which is publicly traded and takes up several industrial-park warehouses in San Jose. Employees print and custom-frame as many as 1,000 canvases a day. "Master illustrators" trained by Kinkade add hand-painted touches to some canvases, while a separate room full of cubicles handles customer service.

"You wonder how long it's going to last," says John Bocchino, a gallery owner and president of the National Association of Limited Edition Dealers. "But I've been selling Kinkade for eight years now, and it just keeps growing and growing."

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Photo credit: gerry Gropp for USA WEEKEND