Overview

The art of self-taught artists - including visionaries, folk creators, spiritualists, recluses, the 'mad' and the socially marginalized - was once scorned by the art establishment. Among the first to value and collect such works was the French artist Jean Dubuffet (1901-85), who coined the term Art Brut, or 'raw art'. He saw Art Brut as the purest form of creation because it was 'uncooked' by culture, touched by a raw nerve and deriving directly from the psyche. Some 50 years later, a wave of enthusiasm for contemporary folk art has gripped countries as far apart as India and the United States. John Maizels ties these disparate strands together, providing an extensive survey of the self-taught art of the twentieth century. Today a bewildering range of terminology has emerged, along with growing enthusiasm, for strains of creative expression outside the conventional art world. In Raw Creation, Maizels traces the history of the recognition and study of this art and examines different theories and definitions that have grown up around it. He provides detailed expositions of the work of individual artists ranging from such Art Brut masters as Adolf Wolfli and Aloise Corbaz, to such gifted American folk artists as Bill Traylor and Mose Tolliver. Devoting several chapters to large-scale visionary environments, Maizels takes a broad view, embracing Rodia towers in Watts, Los Angeles, the Palais Ideal in the South of France and Nek Chand's sculpture garden in north India. Raw Creation provides an indispensable guide to self-taught art and a fascinating account of human creativity.

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9780714831497

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'The definitive book on this vastly misunderstood, endlessly fascinating art form.' (Buzz) 'Thoroughly entertaining.' (Design Week) 'A compendium worthy of the vibrant range of human creativity it documents.' (Time Out New York)

"""The definitive book on this vastly misunderstood, endlessly fascinating art form.""—Buzz ""Thoroughly entertaining.""—Design Week ""A compendium worthy of the vibrant range of human creativity it documents.""—(Time Out New York"

The art of visionaries, folk creators, spiritualists, recluses, the 'mad' and the socially marginalized, once scorned, is now recognized as speaking with immediacy and power. Amongst the earliest to value such work was the French artist Jean Dubuffet, who coined the term Art Brut, literally 'raw art' - raw because it was 'uncooked' by culture, because it came directly from the psyche, touched by a raw nerve. Some 50 years later, there is a new enthusiasm for contemporary folk art in countries as far apart as India and the United States. This book draws the disparate strands together to provide a guide to the self-taught art of the 20th century. Following a brief history of the recognition and study of this art, John Maizels looks at the different theories and explanations that have grown up around the subject. He provides detailed expositions of the work of various individual artists, and in so doing offers a fascinating account of human creativity. (Kirkus UK)

The definitive book on this vastly misunderstood, endlessly fascinating art form. -Buzz Thoroughly entertaining. -Design Week A compendium worthy of the vibrant range of human creativity it documents. -(Time Out New York

Author Information

John Maizels is Editor of Raw Vision magazine and a widely respected authority on Outsider and self-taught art. Roger Cardinal is Professor of Literary and Visual Studies at the University of Kent at Canterbury and the author of the pioneering study Outsider Art (1972).

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