My Kid Could Paint That

Documentary about a kid called Marla Omstead. From upstate New York, Marla rocketed from normal tot to an artist of international renown – selling hundred of thousands of dollars worth of paintings in a only a few months – at the age of four. Her precocious abstract paintings were compared to Kandinsky, Pollack and even Picasso.

The Marla sensation spread through the art world. Many criticised her parents for so willingly dragging her into the public eye for financial gain. Others said that because her work is comparable to the abstract impressionist greats, her work calls into question the meaningless of modern art. Without intention, Marla revived the age old question: ‘what is art?’.

Then, five months later 60 Minutes did a piece which strongly suggested Marla’s dad – an amateur painter – was in fact doing the work. The media and public quickly turned on the poor girl. The family was heavily criticised, they received hate mail, and were ostracized by their own town. So, the Olmstead’s turned to filmmaker Amir Bar-Lev to clear the air and this documentary is the result. In seeking the truth, Bar-Lev claims to have been “torn between his own responsibility as a journalist and the family’s desire to see their integrity restored”.

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