Mini Monet, or what 11-year-old Kieron Williamson is now called by his fans around the world, is one of the most successful painters today.
At just 11 years old, Kieron "Mini Monet" Williamson has a waiting list of ver 700 connoisseurs and is earning millions.
Last July, 23 of Mini Monet Williamson’s works sold for £242,095 in less than 20 minutes – almost as much as Wayne Rooney pockets a week at Manchester United.
“He disappears into his studio with the radio on and we never know what he’s going to paint,” says his mom Michelle, 40, a former nurse and nutritional therapist, speaking to me from the family home.
“A watercolour can take a couple of hours, an oil painting a few weeks depending on the size and complexity.”
Mini Monet is giving Pablo Picasso a run for his money. By nine years old Picasso had created a masterpiece, Le Picador. Kieron was seven when an exhibition sold out within minutes for £150,000. He has since made enough money to buy his parents a new home and to invest in coveted paintings by such artists as LS Lowry.
Kieron is not autistic, as many have presumed, but just “an ordinary young boy with an extraordinary gift and determination” according to Michelle and his dad, Keith, 47, a former electrician.
In a bid to protect Kieron from exploitation they now manage all his business and commercial affairs. But what makes his story more astonishing is that until six years ago the extent of his artistic abilities was colouring in dinosaurs drawn for him by his parents.
That was until a holiday in Cornwall in May 2008 when he asked for a sketch pad and began to draw boats, hillsides and houses. His parents quickly saw an astonishing progression, noted his instinctive ability to mix colours and enrolled him in art classes.
“Like all parents we want to harness our children’s interests,” says Michelle. They also have a daughter Billie-Jo, nine. “If something sets your child’s heart alight, be it ballet or football or art, you have to protect and nurture it whether they’re good at it or not. The last thing we wanted was to tell Kieron he’d have to wait until he was 16 to pursue his love of art.”
His first collection of 19 paintings sold for £14,000 in a sealed bid auction in 2009. Many of his works have sold for more than £45,000 a piece, attracting buyers from Canada, the US, Taiwan and Japan, including “high-profile celebrities and a royal family”. He has a team of independent lawyers to manage his earnings and in 2010 Keiron Williamson Ltd was set up and has seen profits more than double in the past 12 months to £500,000.
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