Outside of the box

“Black Swans at the Wash pool”

DW1, 2024

There has recently been a number of references to Outsider Art on the internet. The comments have caused much discussion, and in some cases outright offence, as things online often do. Most mean to simply refer to artists without formal training. Arguably, with the proliferation of online tutorials, videos and courses, so called self taught artists can have had considerable training. There is however a bit more to the meaning of Outsider Art, that I think is where many have become upset. The term Outsider Art was coined in 1972 by art critic Roger Cardinal. It was the English equivalent to Art Brut, a label created in the 1940’s by the French artist Jean Dubuffet. He used it to describe art created outside the boundaries of official culture. Dubuffet cited examples with emphasis on psychiatric hospital patients, hermits, or spiritualists. It is however a pretty long bow to take make offence in 2024, when so much art can be produced, propagated, displayed and sometimes sold without formality, or indeed overt mental illness. #iamanoutsiderartbrut #letsmakelemonade