In my opinion, this guy has no more talent than any of his peers. What he does have is more front than Blackpool and a highly effective and, by the sounds of it, quite forceful PR / Marketing team.
I think that is exactly it. He has a decent grasp of the technical aspects of his art but no more than any of his peers or frankly some of us here. His art is that he knows his audience, knows how to sell to it & what his market will bear.
This is something that always amazes me. People just seem to love blandness.
Don’t underestimate mediocrity. Whether it is for comfort, convenience, peer pressure, or being part of a “herd” it is an incredibly powerful instinct or motivation in our culture. You see it in many aspects of our western culture – from a lame sitcom that lasts more than a decade, a middle of the road movie that make millions, to mass produced fast food on every corner & convenience food in every home kitchen, to the bland & unchallenging art that wouldn't be out of place in your grandmother’s living room. While I certainly, in my youth, raged against that stuff but as I enter middle age I recognise its appeal. Frankly it is likely easier to sell a Peter Lik in Las Vegas then it is to sell, say, a Roger Ballen. As my dad would say “A nice steak is great but sometimes you just want a peanut butter sandwich.”
Or another way to look at it - given time something bland & boring can become cool. Like this supposed pristine 50's kitchen:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/27212557@N05/sets/72157623429185132/#I'd kill for a kitchen like that now but as a teen I'd likely think it looked bourgeois or square.
Maybe the cool kids a generation from now will want to have Thomas Kinkaid & Peter Lik pictures!
