UNCOLLECTED

by Norman O. Mustill, Jan Herman (Foreword)

These pages illustrate the variety of artworks that a little-known master artist produced over the years. Most have appeared in scattered places but have never been collected in one place — thus the title. Norman O. Mustill made many other pieces besides these that haven’t been collected or even seen by any but a few devotees, certainly not by art collectors. I’m thinking, for example, of the blazing series of riotous, full-color, wall-size collages made of billboard fragments that used to hang in his California living room and are now stored away in a shed in Arizona. None of this is an accident. Mustill refused to play the “art game.” Nor did any arbiters of the art world come knocking on his door, which is hardly surprising. He shunned publicity, guarding his privacy at any cost. You certainly won’t find much about him on the Internet. Less curmudgeon than extreme dissenter, he resembled William S. Burroughs in this Nothing pleased him more than reaming out the human race. His compositions stopped you dead with their viciousness, not to mention their technical perfection and satirical intent. Which isn’t to say he lacked a lightness of touch. He could lower the boom playfully when he liked. Consider the “O” in Norman O. Mustill. It stood for “Ogue,” the middle name he took as a single-word manifesto against everything Vogue – V = Ogue. If you were lucky enough to know him personally, as I did over many years, you’d find yourself chortling in gales of laughter. He loved to entertain his friends by taking note of the world’s solemnities and making exquisite fun of them. It was his supreme delight. --Jan Herman

129 pages, Paperback

Published March 2, 2019

Reviews

[Victor · Rating 5 out of 5]

(2019 version) As there isn't much of a description of this book anywhere I can find, some ultra-basics for the record: primarily collages, this is an incredible collection of the art of Norman Ogue Mustill that collects earlier publications Flypaper, both parts of Twinpak, and the limited portfolio Cuisine Rapide. Essentially the lost link between more "classical" collage artists like Max Ernst or Satty and late 20th century notables of the form like Winston Smith and James Koehnline, Mustill's work is obscure but mesmerizing, hilarious, pointed, and moving, often simultaneously.