- Velvet painting
A velvet painting is a type of
painting widely sold in rural America, frequently havingkitsch themes. They often depict images ofElvis Presley (seeVelvet Elvis ),Dale Earnhardt ,John Wayne ,Jesus , Native Americans, andcowboy s. They can also include more exotic or avant-garde themes.Ciudad Juárez ,Mexico was theFlorence of velvet painting in the 1970s. A displaced Georgia farmboy, Doyle Harden, was the pioneer who created an enormous factory, where velvets were turned out by the thousands by artists sitting in studios.Fact|date=February 2008 One artist would paint one piece of the picture, then slide the velvet along to the next artist, who would add something else. That way velvet paintings were mass produced by hand, fueling the boom in velvet paintings in the 1970s in the United States.Black velvet paintings originate in ancient
Kashmir , the homeland of the fabric. These original paintings were generally religious and portrayed theicon s of theCaucasus region which were painted byRussian Orthodox priests.Marco Polo and others introduced black velvet paintings toWestern Europe , and that some of these early works still hang in theVatican Museums .Edgar Leeteg has been called "the father of American black velvet kitsch". [cite book|last=Liflander|first=Pamela|title=Black Velvet Artist|publisher=Running Press Miniature Editions|date=2003-06-03|isbn=0762414782]References
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