Art
Exploring an Expanded Field at the Outsider Art Fair
Nowhere can you feel the silliness (and yet cloying realness) of the term "outsider art" more distinctly than at the Outsider Art Fair, which, by its very nature, is an insiders' affair.
Outsider Art
Art
Finding a Voice in Fiber, Judith Scott Was an Artist, Not an Outsider
In the first major retrospective of her sculptural bundles of yarn and found objects, the late Judith Scott is celebrated not just for having found a way to creatively express herself late in life, after being institutionalized with Down syndrome and undiagnosed deafness; instead, the Brooklyn Museu
Art
Bertus Jonkers, Sculptor of Mini Metropolises
One of the strange, miniature cityscapes that Dutch artist Bertus Jonkers spent much of his life building is among the star attractions in Sous le vent de l'art brut 2: De Stadshof, an outsider art exhibition in Paris.
Art
A Single Woman Is a Witch: Battling to Save the Art Environment of Mary Nohl
Over a period of 50 years, the artist Mary Nohl transformed her yard as well as the interior and exterior of her cottage into an environment that stands in conversation with the surrounding land, lake, and her childhood memories. Almost immediately after the first cement sculptures materialized in t
Art
In London, Showcases for Self-Taught Artists’ Works
LONDON — Back in the 1970s, England, the home of such pioneering researchers in the outsider art field as Roger Cardinal and the late Victor Musgrave, played a significant role in calling attention to a subfield which, at that time, was still emerging within the art world’s international terrain.
Film
Now on Film: The Mysterious Healing Power of Emery Blagdon’s Art
Yesterday evening’s nationwide PBS broadcast of Kelly Rush’s new documentary short, Emery Blagdon & His Healing Machine, served as a reminder of just what it is that distinguishes the lives and careers of the most exemplary outsider artists.
Art
A Play for the Enigmatic Henry Darger
An independent theater in Chicago is adapting Henry Darger's life into a play. The effort, currently accepting funds on Indiegogo, aims to draw attention to the life of the prolific outsider artist and creator of the illustrated tale of the "Vivian Girls," a man whose own story has thus far been rel
Art
The Artistic Madness of the American South
The insane, or seemingly insane, have constituted a good chunk of “outsider art” since the term’s inception, so it’s no surprise that When the Stars Begin to Fall: Imagination and the American South, now in the last week of its run at the Studio Museum in Harlem, includes a few of them.
Art
Outsider Art Preview: Blurred Categories and Fairs Big and Small
Has the outsider art field become a victim of its own success? If so, it is a peculiar “victim,” and its success must be measured by standards that go beyond the money-obsessed art world’s primary criterion for determining aesthetic value — the price tag that any specific work happens to sport at an
Opinion
Life-size Dolls of the Dead and Disappeared
"I never thought it would turn into this," 64-year-old Ayano Tsukimi says while surveying her decade-long dedication to making dolls of the dead and disappeared in her nearly abandoned town of Nagoro, Japan.
Art
From Outside to Inside on Chicago's North Side
CHICAGO — Outsider art is an overused, perhaps even misused, term. By a strict definition it refers to someone who makes art outside the official and even unofficial milieu in which artists get training, education, and exhibitions.
Art
The Sci-Fi Writer Who Used Photography to Search for Ancient Aliens
In the 1940s, science fiction fans were gripped by tales of an underworld of nefarious beings preying on the humans up above.