| PAINT BY NUMBERS
( ABC Good Morning America )
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM
AND MAY BE UPDATED.
They always say a picture is worth a thousand words. Fifty years ago, a phenomenon
was born that proved it's also worth a thousand numbers. Back then, paint-by-numbers
kits could turn you into an instant da Vinci.
Now, long after paint-by-numbers, the craze has faded, the sets are collectors' items.
ABC News's Beth Nissen fills us in.
DAN ROBBINS, Paint by Numbers Creator: What I had to do was, do the outline...
BETH NISSEN, ABC News: (voice-over) Dan Robbins, a professional illustrator, had a
bright idea back in 1949.
DAN ROBBINS: I traced the colors on that and reproduced that outline, which you see
right here.
BETH NISSEN: (voice-over) A do-it-yourself oil painting kit.
DAN ROBBINS: So we came out with the original slogan that said, "A beautiful oil
painting the first time you try."
BETH NISSEN: (voice- over) By 1952, the number of
those painting by number was almost without number, adults, then children were hooked.
ANNOUNCER: (TV commercial) Could a 10-year-old have painted a picture like this?
BETH NISSEN: (voice-over) Horses were among the most popular subjects. So were
clowns and kittens and ballerinas and more kittens.
DAN ROBBINS: We probably had eight or 10 what I would call basic lines, landscapes,
seascapes, flowers, pets, animals, covering every price range from a dollar all the way up
to $14.95.
BETH NISSEN: (voice-over) By 1954, millions of Americans were painting spring,
summer, fall, and winter. Factories that made the Craft Master kits worked overtime to
keep up with demand.
DAN ROBBINS: We went from 12 employees to 1,200 employees. We went from
doing 250 sets a day to doing 50,000 a day.
BETH NISSEN: (voice-over) Not everyone liked paint-by- numbers, especially the do-it-
yourself reproductions of old masters. They caused a great hue and cry among artists and
art critics. They weren't original, they weren't art.
DAN ROBBINS: Paint-by-numbers were panned because we insisted that you had to
stay within the lines, and you couldn't exercise your own individuality.
BETH NISSEN: (voice-over) But others saw paint-by-numbers as classically American,
democratic access to an elite art form, painting. Anyone could be a student of fine art.
DAN ROBBINS: There is an art lesson inherent in what they're doing, and these colors
are more than just unrelated colors. They actually create form, light, dark.
BETH NISSEN: (voice-over) So "Whatever Happened to Paint-by- Numbers?" That's
the title of a history Dan Robbins has written. The answer? Toy and craft stores still sell
kits for landscapes and kittens, horses and kittens.
More of today's kits are designed for children, with brighter acrylic paints, not oils, and
New Age, space-age subjects they can paint by hand.
SCOTT BURKE, Craft House: With so much time spent on computers, you know,
parents are also looking for ways to provide activities that aren't in front of the screen all
the time.
BETH NISSEN: (voice-over) Computers are responsible for the newest paint-by-
numbers market. Companies like Z-Art in Los Angeles can now turn personal
photographs into paint-by- numbers kits.
JAMES GOULD, Z-Art: You can send in your favorite paintings, you can send in
pictures of people, of animals, your pets, your home, anything. We scan the photograph,
and we reduce those millions of colors down to the 42 colors that are in our palette. And
then we print out a numbered outline on textured art paper.
BETH NISSEN: (voice-over) Paint by the numbers, and you have a portrait, an
heirloom, a colorful part of American culture.
For Good Morning America, this is Beth Nissen.
DIANE SAWYER: You used to be able to buy some of the old sets, like the Beatles, for
50 cents, but today they can be $250, collectors' items.
(Commercial Break) (Local News) (Commercial Break)
Transcribed by Federal Document Clearing House, Inc. under license from American Broadcasting Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. |