My Kid Could Paint That - True/False Film Fest

My Kid Could Paint That

From True Vision Award honoree Amir Bar-Lev. A four-year-old who paints abstract works of modern art and then sells them for thousands of dollars a piece? Armed with his camera, Bar-Lev traveled to upstate New York to document Marla Olmstead and her family. All was good. But then a 60 Minutes story suggested that the paintings might be fakes (painted all or in part by Marla’s father) and suddenly nothing was tidy. Once again, Bar-Lev deconstructs a high-concept story, wringing out the sensationalism and replacing it with a complex inquiry into the nature of both art and celebrity. He even questions his own role as part of the media circus. Allowing no easy answers, My Kid Could Paint That makes for richly ambiguous art that will keep you debating with your neighbor long after the credits roll. (DW)
Director: Amir Bar-Lev
Runtime: 1:22
In-person: director Amir Bar-Lev
Fest Year: 2014
Marla is a child artist who has sold hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of paintings. But is she the real deal?