Maud Lewis - but is it art?

A painting by beloved Nova Scotia folk artist Maud Lewis just sold for a record breaking $350,000. Does that make it no longer "folk art"?

The story goes - and there is always a story attached to these kinds of painting and these kinds of artists - that she originally sold the painting for a grilled cheese sandwich (although the actual story is more complicated than that). Ms. Lewis is a source of many such cute stories, and they have become part of her persona, part of her mystique. She has risen in recent decades from nothing to be considered a national treasure and icon (or certainly a provincial one) and one of Canada's great artists.

It's kind of hard to figure out quite why. Her paintings are bright and simplistic and bucolic, the kind of thing usually described as "something a child could do" (hence the label "folk art", I guess, whatever that label might mean). Some people are loathe to ennoble her art because she sold her paintings for a living, which is just elitist claptrap. She herself famously proclaimed, "I ain't no real artist. I just like to paint". 

And it's true: her paintings are not particularly interesting, original or challenging in any way. They are just fun and joyful, and that seems to be why people like her work. Is that why people pay $350,000 for them, though? I'm pretty sure not. Like Andy Warhol, Banksy and many another unorthodox artist, she has become a product of the art world. Their works are more famous for their signature and their back-story than for any actual artistic merit.

So, is it art? Well, sure. Art can be any number of things, and I for one am not going to wade into the quagmire of trying to define it and justify it. Is it great art? Well, I wouldn't say so, but whoever plunked down $350,000 for Black Truck clearly thinks so. Unless it was just someone's idea of a shrewd financial investment.