Being able to paint copies of a Picasso does not make you a great artist. It makes you a great reproductionist and it's probably a marketable skill. Nor does

Being able to paint copies of a Picasso does not make you a great artist. It makes you a great reproductionist and it's probably a marketable skill. Nor does it deserve respect from the artistic community. "Respect" is a highly subjective thing that is often achieved at a net negative cost. Historically, many respected artists were under-appreciated by their contemporaries, dying broke and alone. All it says is that I have enough skill to operate a paint brush when given an exact template. The skill of an artisan is not necessarily measured by originality. And unlike a quality such as "great artist", skill is largely quantifiable, the rarer the ability, (typically) the greater the demand for it.