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I noticed the site generally sticks to unknown artists and most of the work is very similar to student works I've seen. They're, as Frank Stella described himself in college, "a bunch of little jerks running around reading Artforum." There are also some pieces there done by the little old ladies that used to take the continuing education courses and do paintings of the flowers from the front of sympathy cards. I can't really laugh at it, having done so much bad art myself. One of my instructors told me that he was fairly certain Leonardo da Vinci probably had a closet full of crappy drawings somewhere.

There's always a little bit of risk in doing anything creative. If you know how it's going to look when you're finished, is it really a creative effort?

As to Thomas Kinkade being represented on the site, I find his work to be almost hideously fascinating, a Charles Dickens Christmas Card on steroids. However, he'd sue the everloving dog crap out of the site if they included his works, particularly in a derogatory manner, as would most artists who are financially successful and well-known. Kinkade, though, is known as being a particularly nasty piece of work.

Much of being successful in the Art World, especially the New York Art world, is tied up with a magnified sense of self-importance. The artists cannot deal with ridicule, because if someone makes fun of their paintings, the price goes down. People who buy these works can't deal with the "Emperor's new clothes" problem.

As to Picasso, I don't care for his work, but I know what he was trying to do, and he made a bunch of bucks while doing exactly the kind of work he enjoyed doing. If his work were exhibited anyplace, and the name of the artist wasn't known, I don't think it would be particularly successful.