I find your comparison to be ridiculous and frankly, quite ignorant.

You are right about patron sponsorship of artists though. And thankfully, she has developed her skill to a point where she is not reliant on selling her work exclusively for income (in fact, she is an entrepreneur who has opened her own private studio for teaching).

The fact remains though; while I appreciate the low-cost nature of the "product". I hope anyone who buys one of these realizes that it is not a real work of art (outside of the virtue of the original photograph) and that there is in fact real (and more) value and real (and much, much more) skill that goes into making true original oil paintings.

I doubt that anyone who has their face painted into Dogs Playing Poker is under the impression that they're purchasing "Fine Art."