Thomas Kinkade Winter Wonderland

McLennon Pen Co. Gallery is pleased to announce the opening of the Thomas Kinkade Winter Wonderland, an exhibition featuring three extremely rare original paintings by the artist and a plethora of editioned artworks and memorabilia. Set in a holiday-themed installation inspired by the late artist’s legacy, the show is an examination of a misunderstood artist who is now being reevaluated in the years since his passing in 2012. The poignant new documentary, Art For Everybody, shines a new light on the self-proclaimed “Painter of Light” as significantly more multidimensional than his carefully crafted persona made him appear. This exhibition is a survey of Kinkade’s marketing brilliance and a celebration of holiday kitsch– there will be Kinkade paintings of snowy streets and warm glowing houses, a Christmas tree room adorned with his studio’s commercial products, a Kinkade electric train set with a mini village, and even fake snow outside of the gallery.

A unique and often misunderstood artist, Kinkade was not accepted by the art world, even at the peak of his prominence in the 1990s and 2000s. He pitted himself against the elite art establishment, saying that he preferred to make artwork for “real people.” While there is no mention of him in art history books, and his work has rarely been exhibited in internationally recognized galleries, or museums, the artist was said to have his work in 1 out of every 20 homes in America during his lifetime. Arguably the most financially successful artist in the early 2000s, Kinkade had hundreds of stores selling just his artworks in malls and vacation towns across the country. His former art publishing company, Media Arts Group, Inc., made hundreds of thousands of reproductions of his artwork, at one point was making over 100 million USD a year, and was even publicly traded on the stock market. Monetary success aside, Kinkade once said in an interview defending his career: “My art is relevant because it is relevant to 10 million people. That makes me the most relevant artist in current culture, not the least.”