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World of Art
Outsider Art: Alternativas Espontaneas
Outsider Art is work produced outside the mainstream of modern art by self-taught, untrained visionaries, spiritualists, eccentric recluses, folk artists, psychiatric patients, criminals, and others beyond the imposed margins of society and the art market. Coined by Roger Cardinal in 1972, the term in English derived from Jean Dubuffet's "art brut"--literally "raw art," "uncooked" by culture, unaffected by fashion, unmoved by artistic standards. In this indispensable book Colin Rhodes surveys the history and reception of Outsider Art--first championed by Dubuffet and the Surrealists, now appreciated by a wide public--while providing insight into the achievements of both major figures and newly discovered artists. From spirit-guided Madge Gill to schizophrenic Adolf Wlfli, these individuals passionately and obsessively pursue the pictorial expression of their vision.
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First published January 1, 2000
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Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews
April 25, 2021
In the real world, Henry J. Darger worked as an orderly in a Chicago hospital and lived as a recluse in a cramped apartment. In his spare time he created an alternative cosmos, an extraordinary body of work which runs to 15,000 pages (nine million words) and is illustrated by hundreds of drawings, collages and watercolours. Its title is The Story of the Vivian Girls in What is Known as the Realms of the Unreal, of the Glandeco-Angelinian War Storm, Caused by the Child Slave Rebellion. In this other-universe Darger was an important figure—Captain Darger (although not the absolute hero; the seven Vivian sisters are the heroines). What’s most important to understand about it, though, is that this was an entirely private work—it was never intended for publication, or even to be read at all by anyone else.
This is an example of what is now known as ‘outsider art’. Although that term was coined in the 1970s (as the title of a book by the English author Roger Cardinal) its origins lie in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries when a few resident psychiatrists working in lunatic asylums in central Europe began to take an interest in their patients’ drawings, rather than just routinely throwing them out. The likes of Picasso and Klee explored these outer fringes too, in their search for new ways of doing art; the Surrealists were inspired by it; from the 1940s onwards it was championed (as ‘l'art brut’) by Jean Dubuffet. Today it’s gaining a much wider audience.
Outsider art is art from outside the artistic mainstream, art still not even recognised as art by many. It is art produced by the inmates of lunatic asylums/psychiatric institutions; by the inmates of ordinary prisons; by spiritualist ‘mediums’; by people with unusual (often religious) beliefs; by the socially isolated; by artistically untrained creative obsessives; by eccentrics. It is produced by people living on the margins of society, excluded not just from mainstream art but from society itself by dysfunctional personalities, grinding poverty, class or lack of education. It can include paintings and drawings, writings, photographs, music, sculptures, weird machines, even architecture; from simple pages covered with scribbles, to meticulously executed architectural blueprints. Some (for instance the Watts Towers in Los Angeles) have become famous. These works are, in Colin Rhodes’s words, ‘spontaneous expressive outpourings from the well-springs of creativity, unmuddied by artistic training or received knowledge’; and this book is a good general introduction to the subject.
As more comes to light about the lives of the artists themselves, this art is becoming more comprehensible too. Take Henry Darger for instance: at four his mother died; then his younger sister was given away for adoption; at twelve, though perfectly intelligent, he was sent to an Asylum for Feebleminded Children where he was beaten routinely and from which he escaped aged seventeen. He lived the majority of the rest of his life alone, and The Vivian Girls was only discovered (by accident by his landlord) not long before his death in 1973. Darger collected newspaper clippings about lost, kidnapped and murdered children, and incorporated these children into his story: it’s as if he was trying—by adopting them almost—to transfer them from our horrible world into his own universe where they’d be safe.
This is an example of what is now known as ‘outsider art’. Although that term was coined in the 1970s (as the title of a book by the English author Roger Cardinal) its origins lie in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries when a few resident psychiatrists working in lunatic asylums in central Europe began to take an interest in their patients’ drawings, rather than just routinely throwing them out. The likes of Picasso and Klee explored these outer fringes too, in their search for new ways of doing art; the Surrealists were inspired by it; from the 1940s onwards it was championed (as ‘l'art brut’) by Jean Dubuffet. Today it’s gaining a much wider audience.
Outsider art is art from outside the artistic mainstream, art still not even recognised as art by many. It is art produced by the inmates of lunatic asylums/psychiatric institutions; by the inmates of ordinary prisons; by spiritualist ‘mediums’; by people with unusual (often religious) beliefs; by the socially isolated; by artistically untrained creative obsessives; by eccentrics. It is produced by people living on the margins of society, excluded not just from mainstream art but from society itself by dysfunctional personalities, grinding poverty, class or lack of education. It can include paintings and drawings, writings, photographs, music, sculptures, weird machines, even architecture; from simple pages covered with scribbles, to meticulously executed architectural blueprints. Some (for instance the Watts Towers in Los Angeles) have become famous. These works are, in Colin Rhodes’s words, ‘spontaneous expressive outpourings from the well-springs of creativity, unmuddied by artistic training or received knowledge’; and this book is a good general introduction to the subject.
As more comes to light about the lives of the artists themselves, this art is becoming more comprehensible too. Take Henry Darger for instance: at four his mother died; then his younger sister was given away for adoption; at twelve, though perfectly intelligent, he was sent to an Asylum for Feebleminded Children where he was beaten routinely and from which he escaped aged seventeen. He lived the majority of the rest of his life alone, and The Vivian Girls was only discovered (by accident by his landlord) not long before his death in 1973. Darger collected newspaper clippings about lost, kidnapped and murdered children, and incorporated these children into his story: it’s as if he was trying—by adopting them almost—to transfer them from our horrible world into his own universe where they’d be safe.
January 30, 2025
Reread. Excellent overview not just of the "canon" of outsider artists but the history of the field as well as a genuinely insightful commentary on the theoretical and conceptual problems of how the "outsider" is defined. The author is opinionated but fair. Makes you wonder how many brilliant artists lived and died without anyone ever seeing or appreciating their work,as could have so easily happened with many of the artists here. It also made me wonder if there's any possibility for a true outsider art in today's world, circumscribed as it is by the omnipresent networking of the Internet. Every outsider culture can now be so quickly captured and made consciously ironic (like those hand painted African posters for western movies that blew up as memes and are now in "official" circulation). The outsider now is rarely ever hermetically sealed like the lunatic asylum hermits of yesteryear, now they are immediately entering into deviantart feedback loops or content microgenres. Insert Baudrillard quote of your choice here.
September 28, 2009
Found this on the shelf, the most interesting factor is the connection between all art. Children's art, modern artists, prison art, art of the mentally ill, they all have connections and patterns. Primitive art and its imagery is an expression no matter who you are and artistic talent can be gifted to anyone.
August 9, 2019
Very interesting for someone who has held a distant interest in folk/outsider art but didnt know much about it. Still, though, the author can drone on a bit about subjects that seem more purely historical than art-historical at times. Lots of great art included, in color about 30% of the time.
November 12, 2019
It's not a bad introduction, and I did pick up the names of a few new artists to check out. It doesn't go into much depth about any given artist though, and some of the brief summaries are a bit misleading if you've spent some time studying the artist in question. Fine for what it is.
February 22, 2018
I want more books on this topic! This one was ok. Kinda bland
September 14, 2022
Fresh perspective
February 21, 2024
Good summary with good illustrations of key artists considered outsiders.
April 21, 2009
The search for artistic definition continues in this scholarly approach to l'art brut,, more popularly known as "outsider," or folk, art. Author/essayist Colin Rhodes acknowledges the inherent challenges to define a non-genre such as outsider art. Typified as being the sincere creative output compiled by unversed, societally damaged individuals, Rhodes deconstructs such commonly-held stereotypes through example and exposition.
"Unenlightened criticism of modern western art often focuses on perceived similarities with children's drawings," writes Rhodes early in this examination. "Yet, the economy of means and apparent spontaneity achieved in the work of trained professionals does not signal a continuation of childhood, but a 'recovery' at a highly sophisticated level of certain childlike features." Any comparison between that which typifies outsider art and the output by unskilled childish hands stops beyond that which is purely superficial; the child depicts the most prominent features, just as many outsider artists, though not necessarily through an almost obsessive need to express that which cannot be put into words.
The element of the surreal - whether formulated within the hallucinations of the tormented or incarcerated, or fermented within the free mind forever voyaging - does not qualify such art easily, either. The paradoxically stringent standards of what defines outsider art is in a near-frequent state of flux, with certain artists drifting in and out of the so-called external realm.
Rhodes does not deign to definitively comprehend such semi-lucid designations, though he does present a wide variety of examples, along with a line or two of non-critical description. The closest Rhodes comes to critical analysis, in fact, arises from a brief reference to the work of schizophrenic pedophile Roland Claude Wilkie as being "unremittingly brutal" and containing "nothing to be celebrated" other than representing a "most chilling potentiality of the human psyche."
Outsider Art: Spontaneous Alternatives presents an intellectual's guide to the phenomenon to l'art brut, touching on the varied aspects of cultural collision, cognitive defect, and creative obsession which all formulate a part of the colloidal coagulation which brings together (and forever holds apart) the lives and output of these Outsiders.
"Unenlightened criticism of modern western art often focuses on perceived similarities with children's drawings," writes Rhodes early in this examination. "Yet, the economy of means and apparent spontaneity achieved in the work of trained professionals does not signal a continuation of childhood, but a 'recovery' at a highly sophisticated level of certain childlike features." Any comparison between that which typifies outsider art and the output by unskilled childish hands stops beyond that which is purely superficial; the child depicts the most prominent features, just as many outsider artists, though not necessarily through an almost obsessive need to express that which cannot be put into words.
The element of the surreal - whether formulated within the hallucinations of the tormented or incarcerated, or fermented within the free mind forever voyaging - does not qualify such art easily, either. The paradoxically stringent standards of what defines outsider art is in a near-frequent state of flux, with certain artists drifting in and out of the so-called external realm.
Rhodes does not deign to definitively comprehend such semi-lucid designations, though he does present a wide variety of examples, along with a line or two of non-critical description. The closest Rhodes comes to critical analysis, in fact, arises from a brief reference to the work of schizophrenic pedophile Roland Claude Wilkie as being "unremittingly brutal" and containing "nothing to be celebrated" other than representing a "most chilling potentiality of the human psyche."
Outsider Art: Spontaneous Alternatives presents an intellectual's guide to the phenomenon to l'art brut, touching on the varied aspects of cultural collision, cognitive defect, and creative obsession which all formulate a part of the colloidal coagulation which brings together (and forever holds apart) the lives and output of these Outsiders.
November 9, 2012
It's fairly clearly written and well researched and, for me, goes some way to explaining this current fad among image makers to produce work that looks like they are incarcerated in in clinics for the mentally "challenged". It also made me think I wouldn't actually like to meet and have conversations with any of the people featured in this book. They all seem to have a single dialogue stuck in their minds that goes round and round ad nauseam.
March 13, 2013
I've always enjoyed looking at Outsider Art, I find it pretty fascinating as long as it's not just a bunch of lines and squiggles. Well this book had a few examples of that but there was also some great, unique art work.
August 9, 2008
A good overview of so-called "outsider art"- art made by the mentally insane.
December 2, 2008
This book inspired me to create an exhibition called www.internalguidancesystems.com
it was a visionary show from 2006-2008
Colin Rhodes is brilliant.
it was a visionary show from 2006-2008
Colin Rhodes is brilliant.
November 1, 2011
fascinating, but more of an academic book than literature obviously.
February 10, 2012
Great introduction to the subject.
Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews