Carine Fol (ed.): L'Art brut en question | Outsider Art in Question (2015)

This bilingual book on Outsider Art (art brut) is what might be described as a coffee table book, and yet it doesn't come under that description (which usually means dumb, nothing but gloss, mindless, etc) in terms of content. This is a highly scholarly, fascinating book on an art form which is now being recognised seriously, and the proliferation of such books makes me incapable of judging it along with others on the same subject: there are far too many.

However, this book is a history of outsider art, of its increasing acceptance, of its relationship with art produced in psychiatric hospitals, of the acceptance through the not too distant past of art brut not only as therapy, not only as a means of expression, but as part of the art world in itself. Outsider art (art brut) is authentic art and should be recognised as such. We have come a very long way since the objections to Facteur Cheval's masterpiece in Hauterives as naive, amateur or primitive.

Included in this huge book are the works of familiar names such as Adolf Wölfli, Unica Zürn, Aloïse Corbaz, Josef Hofer, Madge Gill, Henry Darger, Gaston Chaisssac, Johann Hauser, Augustin Lesage, Carlo Zinelli, etc, etc. The cover image is by Dirk Martens, and the endpapers by Michel Dave and (together) Cléa Coudsi and Éric Herbin.

Art brut (Outsider Art) and associated:
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Rémy Callot, Carvin (Nord)
Carine Fol (ed.): L'Art brut en question | Outsider Art in Question
Kevin Duffy, Ashton-in-Makerfield
The Art Brut of Léopold Truc, Cabrières d'Avignon (34)
Le Musée Extraordinaire de Georges Mazoyer, Ansouis (34)
Le Facteur Cheval's Palais Idéal, Hauterives (26)
The Little Chapel, Guernsey
Museum of Appalachia, Norris, Clinton, Tennessee
Ed Leedskalnin in Homestead, Florida
La Fabuloserie, Dicy, Yonne (89)
Street Art City, Lurcy-Lévis, Allier (03)
The Outsider Art of Jean Linard, Neuvy-deux-Clochers (18)
Jean Bertholle, La Fabuloserie, Yonne (89)
Jean-Pierre Schetz, La Fabuloserie, Yonne (89)
Jules Damloup, La Fabuloserie, Yonne (89)
Camille Vidal, La Fabuloserie, Yonne (89)
Pascal Verbena, La Fabuloserie, Yonne (89)
The Art of Theodore Major
Edward Gorey's Yarmouth Port, Cape Cod, MA
Marcel Vinsard in Pontcharra, Isère (38)
Vincent Capt: Écrivainer : La langue morcelée de Samuel Daiber
The Amazing World of Danielle Jacqui, Roquevaire (13)
Alphonse Gurlie, Maisonneuve (07)
Univers du poète ferrailleur, Lizio, Morbihan
Les Rochers sculptés de L'Abbé Fouré, Rothéneuf, Saint-Malo
Robert Tatin in Cossé-le-Vivien, Mayenne
La Demeure du Chaos, Saint-Romain-au-Mont-d'Or, Rhône (69)
René Raoul's Jardin de pierre in Pléhédel, Côtes d'Armor
Emmanuel Arredondo in Varennes Vauzelles, Nièvre (58)
Musée de la Luna Rossa (revisited), Caen, Calvados (14)
La Fontaine de Château-Chinon, Nièvre (58)