Essay by Déborah Couette and Céline Delavaux .. 3...Essay by Déborah Couette and Céline Delavaux .. 3 ... Unsurprisingly, he sharpened his eye on graffiti and Essay Les Barbus
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Essay by Déborah Couette and Céline Delavaux .. 3
Diagram of Research and Investigations ............... 25
Diagram of Networks ......................................... 26
Biographies of Selected Artists ............................ 27
Art Brut Timeline ................................................. 32
Exhibition Lists .................................................... 34
Notes ................................................................ 35
Ingredients
Jean DubuffetPortrait de Michel Tapié1946(courtesy of Galerie 1900-2000, Paris)
What interests me is not cake, it’s bread. Jean Dubuffet, 1947 I In October 1947, the prestigious Galerie René Drouin on Place Vendôme hosted an exhibition of portraits by a certain Monsieur Jean Dubuffet, peintre. One month later, a curious installation of anonymous lava and basalt sculptures heralded the opening of Le Foyer de l’Art Brut in the basement of the very same gallery. To all outward appearances, these two events were unrelated. In reality, a web of invisible threads tied them together, not least of all the personality of their maker, Jean Dubuffet. In the early 1940s, Dubuffet had ended a lucrative career as a wine merchant to devote himself entirely to art. He had become fasci-nated by what he described as art brut. The artist sought to prove that art existed beyond the confines of museums and galleries, and outside the scope of art’s academies and history. He claimed that this form of production contains, like raw fruit, the special vitamins which nourish and enrich us. These were the supplements, he be-lieved, which only existed in raw art, uncontaminated by culture. Dubuffet set off to find his ingredients. His journey began with tribal art, the popular arts, with children’s drawings and so-called art of the insane. There were also drawings and paintings by mediums. His was not the first fascination with such material. The search for an artistic otherness had already inspired the early 20th century’s avant-garde. Yet their attempts at regeneration had been fictional. The quest for art brut allowed Dubuffet to start the process anew, sidestep the mainstream and fortify his own personal practice.
LE FOYER DE L’ART BRUTAN UNDERGROUND KITCHEN FOR UNPROCESSED ART
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For this new recipe, Dubuffet needed allies. He recruited them from the artistic and literary vanguard, many of whose portraits he had painted for his 1947 show. The network revolved around the writer, Jean Paulhan, an influential publisher who worked at Gallimard and had helped Dubuffet find his dealer, René Drouin. It was Drouin who gave art brut its first headquarters, down in the basement of his gallery; and it was here, in November 1947, that Dubuffet assembled the objects and documents which he had collected over the previous years. II The recesses of Le Foyer de l’Art Brut revealed the intensity of Dubuffet’s investigations. Carried out contemporaneously with his own artistic output, this impressive research had unearthed much in the private gardens of writers, artists, art dealers and psychiatrists. Charles Ratton, a dealer in what was then labelled as primitive art, introduced Dubuffet to a group of bearded figurines which had been carved from milestones by an anonymous hand. Originally collected by Joseph-Oscar Müller, these funny little statues were nicknamed Les Barbus Müller. They would go on to form the first ex-hibition at Le Foyer de l’Art Brut. The poet and artist Henri Michaux then helped Dubuffet acquire children’s drawings directly from their teachers. Marionnettes de la ville et de la campagne, presented at Drouin in 1944 by the critic Michel Tapié, was Dubuffet’s inaugu-ral homage to their awkward inventiveness. In response, Drouin’s gallery was inundated with hate mail.
In his earliest texts, published by Gaston Gallimard in 1946, Dubuffet proclaimed a taste for the popular, the ordinary and the commonplace. Unsurprisingly, he sharpened his eye on graffiti and
Essay
Les Barbus Mülleruntitledc 1930-40
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Auguste Forestieruntitled date unknown
tattoos, as had the photographers Brassaï and Robert Doisneau before him, and on artworks made by prison inmates, upon the ad-vice of the eminent anthropologist and visitor to the foyer, Claude Lévi-Strauss. With Anatole Jakovsky, a critic and collector of naïve art, Dubuffet went in search of artwork by les fous. It was thanks to the poet Paul Eluard, who had taken refuge in the Saint-Alban Hospital during the war, that Dubuffet discovered the astonishing toy-maker Auguste Forestier. Sectioned for derailing a passenger train, Forestier was now being collected by the likes of Pablo Picasso. Indeed, interest in what might be called asylum art was nothing new. In 1924 Dubuffet had found a copy of Bildnerei der Geistkranken by the psychiatrist and art historian Dr Hans Prinzhorn: an extraordinary album of hos-pitalised art-making, which the artist Max Ernst circulated amongst his fellow Surrealists. In July 1945, Dubuffet embarked on a voyage to Switzerland with his friend Paulhan and the modernist pioneer, Le Corbusier. The trip was to become legend in the annals of art brut. He marvelled at the finger paintings of the architect’s cousin, Louis Soutter, which had been reproduced in the Surrealist journal Minotaure in 1936. He met Eugène Pittard, the director of the Ethnographic Museum in Geneva, who introduced him to the watercolours of Congolese painter Albert Lubaki, exhibited in Paris as early as 1929. There were also drawings by mediumistic artist Hélène Smith, who had explored Hinduism and the planet Mars under the guidance of the writer Victor Hugo.
Dubuffet visited a number of Swiss psychiatric collections, notably that of Dr Charles Ladame, which would later be exhibited at Le Foyer de l’Art Brut. Yet it was Adolf Wölfli, the patient recognised
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as an artist by Dr Walter Morgenthaler in Ein Geisteskranken als Künstler in 1921, who was to become the leading light of art brut. His monumental autobiography was illustrated with detailed pencil drawings, some up to two metres in size, and contextualised by impossible stories of intra- and extra-terrestrial conquest. Back in France, Dubuffet met with Dr Gaston Ferdière, the celebrated psychiatrist of the poet Antonin Artaud. Ferdière showed him the pharmaceutical watercolours of Guillaume Pujolle and the hallucina-tory figurations of Marguerite Burnat-Provins. These productions delighted Dubuffet, for they corresponded with his subversive ideas on art. His plan was now to disseminate his re-search and he signed a contract with his editor, Gaston Gallimard, for a series entitled Les Cahiers de l’Art Brut. In 1947 Gallimard would renege on his agreement. It was the first in a long series of disappointments. III Dubuffet turned to his gallerist, René Drouin. His proposal, Le Foyer de l’Art Brut, would be a response to the failure of Les Cahiers de l’Art Brut. Dubuffet was all too aware that he needed support. The foyer would be his refuge, a hideaway where his discoveries and ideas about art brut could be presented and preserved. In French, the word foyer implies a hearth, a source of energy. Dubuffet may have hoped that the heatwaves generated by art brut would permeate the ground floor and warm its prestigious visitors. In the years after the war, Galerie René Drouin had gained a repu-tation as a centre for cutting-edge culture. Drouin had premiered the pioneers of abstraction, Wassily Kandinsky and Robert and Sonia Delaunay, and curated exhibitions of l’art informel, a collective
Essay
Adolf Wölfliuntitledc 1920
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Augustin LesageComposition Symboliquec 1932
Miguel Hernandezuntitled1947
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Pascal Désir Maisonneuveuntitled (Ubu Roi)1925
term coined by Michel Tapié for the work of Jean Fautrier, Wols and Jean Dubuffet. Tapié would go on to become a central character in the history of art brut. From the outset, this art critic and jazz man was drawn to the then-scandalous paintings of Jean Dubuffet. His features were immor-talised in Dubuffet’s portrait gallery. He was not only a writer, but a musician, a fact which certainly did not displease the artist, having just completed his painting, Jazz Band. Moreover, this distant cousin of the painter Toulouse-Lautrec was just as interested in self-taught production as Dubuffet. It was Tapié who had discovered the cement medallions and carica-tures of Henri Salingardes, an innkeeper and antiques dealer in the South of France. It was also Tapié who had brought to light the wood-carved tools of a 70-year old poacher and itinerant called Xavier Par-guey. Together, the pair visited an exhibition of tableaux merveilleux by the healer and painter Fleury-Joseph Crépin, who then introduced Dubuffet to his associate Augustin Lesage, the medium whose per-formative spirit-paintings had published in Minotaure in 1933. On the 17th November 1947, two days after the inauguration of Le Foyer de l’Art Brut, Dubuffet handed the keys to Tapié, gave him a list of proposed exhibits, among them Dr Ladame’s collection, and went off to the Algerian Sahara in search of a different kind of exoticism.
IV Tapié took his new role as director seriously. With the backing of Drouin, he oversaw a series of publications which accompanied his temporary displays.
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Miguel Hernandez was a Spanish war veteran living in Montmartre, whose paintings harked back to his colourful past. Jan Krizek was a Czech émigré and trained artist, whose simple stone sculptures were introduced to Tapié by the cubist, Honorio Condoy. Pierre Giraud, nicknamed l’enchanteur Limousin, was a draughtsman and fabrica-tor, whose poet brother was Tapié’s assistant and had introduced Dubuffet to tattoos. Yet Le Foyer de l’Art Brut seemed different. It had become a rendez-vous, where artworks could be bought and sold. That seemed a long way from Dubuffet’s original conceit. Upon his return, Dubuffet criticised Tapié’s slapdash performance. He accused him of being trop brouillon et trop fou, of exposing works which were neither inventive nor counter-cultural enough to conform to art brut. Worst of all, Tapié had been duped. Rob-ert Véreux was the invention of Dr Robert Forestier, a physician, collector and amateur painter, who had submitted a series of naive dreamscapes pretending to be the work of an art brut artist. The creator of art brut took back the reins. Dubuffet’s formative displays included treasures from the collection: the delicate pastel romances of Aloïse Corbaz, the embroideries of hospitalised medi-um Jeanne Tripier and the influential imaginings of Heinrich Anton Müller. Yet Dubuffet also exhibited an art brut hoax. Les Statues de silex de M Juva was an ensemble of pre-historic flintstone artefacts - includ-ing tools, arrows, and the faces of people and animals - from a pseudo-sanctuary in the suburbs of Paris. Juva was actually Antonin Alfred Juritzky, a former Austrian prince, who had developed his passion for early human history into a formal Neolithic fantasy. Ju-va’s anthromorphic stones had duped the scientific community of the time and had even caught the attention of André Breton, the pope
Essay
Fleury-Joseph Crépinuntitled (No 58, Architecture)1940
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Aloïse CorbazLoge à Pie XIdate unknown
Louis SoutterMadone Van der Veydendate unknown
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Juvauntitledc 1940
of Surrealism. But Dubuffet was not fooled. For him, Juva was yet another way for him to attack art history at its roots, and to reveal how art history was constructed of arbitrary fictions. V If Dubuffet ever doubted that he could break bread with Breton, he was convinced after they met in 1948. Breton had long been fascinated by alternative formats. Dubuffet needed a formidable ally. His basement installation was not shining as brightly as he had imagined. Visitors should have been struck by an evidentiary bolt of lightning. The raw production, exemplary creativity and unedited invention was meant to reveal the impotence of l’art culturel - the official art which had been heated and re-heated until it was devoid of nutritional value. In other words, people should have been experi-encing a revelation. Instead, Le Foyer de l’Art Brut was perceived as an oddity: a mildly amusing space, with the feel of a flea market, but not a venue for a radical new discourse on art. With Breton as his partner-in-crime, Dubuffet returned to his earliest construct: to publish a definitive study of art brut. In the spirit of the pre-war artists of Der Blaue Reiter, the pair conspired to edit an al-manac for which Breton wrote his famous 1948 essay: L’art des fous, la clé des champs. The project would also contain reference to some of Breton’s favoured authors, like the revered Haitian feather-painter, Hector Hyppolite, and Adalbert Trillhaase, the not-so-naïve German artist feted by Otto Dix.
Yet L’Almanach de l’Art Brut was not their only ambitious project together. It was the first in a series of activities proposed through a new organisation: La Compagnie de l’Art Brut. Founder members included Jean Paulhan, Michel Tapié, Charles Ratton, and the writer
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and art dealer, Henri-Pierre Roché. Dubuffet believed this team would maintain a position for art brut which was undiluted, uncompromised and strictly non-commercial. A legal structure seemed appropriate for a collection which had grown so exponentially. For example, through Breton and the artist André Lhote, Dubuffet had acquired some shell-masks by satirist and brocanteur, Pascal-Désir Maisonneuve. They, and all the other works, needed to be protected. A new organisation demanded a new command centre. Le Foyer de l’Art Brut decamped from its underground home at Galerie René Drouin for an equally high-profile location: a pavilion loaned by Gas-ton Gallimard and located next to la Pléiade. From September 1948 to June 1949, Dubuffet entrusted the day-to-day running not to a critic, but to an artist. Slavko Kopač was a little-known Croatian painter who had recently moved to France. An admirer of Dubuffet, he would go on to assist the older artist in mounting ten exhibitions at the foyer, including the remarkable carvings of a Spanish-born cork-maker, Joaquim Vicens Gironella. Yet despite these numerous and varied displays, despite the accom-panying booklets edited by La Compagnie de l’Art Brut, despite the constant resistance to the cultural mainstream, Le Foyer de l’Art Brut remained at a dead-end: invisible and unknown to the public at large. VI Dubuffet did not see his new foyer as being tied to one location. He envisioned exhibitions at home and abroad, projects which would disperse his idea on art brut. In October 1949 he returned for a brief sojourn at Galerie René Drouin. This time the installation occupied the entire ground floor, with over 200 works and 63 makers displayed in broad daylight.
Essay
Joaquim Vicens Gironellauntitledc 1945
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Gaston Chaissacuntitled1944
Amongst the plethora of objects on view were statuettes made of wood and coal by Gaston Chaissac, a self-taught painter and poet long celebrated by Jean Paulhan et Raymond Queneau. There were also a selection obsessive faces and detailed botanies by the British doodler, Scottie Wilson, brought to Dubuffet’s attention by the Surre-alists Roland Penrose and ELT Mesens. Dubuffet was confident he would set the art world ablaze. He penned a text whose title could not have been clearer, and which would go on to become his manifesto: L’Art brut preferé aux arts culturels. Dubuffet’s subversive intent only encouraged Drouin, whose gallery had now become an experimental forum and a venue for debate. Together, they welcomed artists like Paul Klee, Jacques Villon, Gino Severini, Raoul Ubac, Hans Hartung and Clovis Trouille. Yet despite the fanfare, the recipe failed to impress. The media fell silent. The few fans there were, seemed not to understand the nature of this revolu-tion. Even André Breton appeared more committed to his Surrealist uprising than to Jean Dubuffet’s art brut. It was a brave but doomed attempt. The foyer returned quietly to its home at Pavilion Gallimard. Dubuffet and his wife Lili worked togeth-er and alone to give it some permanence. From that day on, until its closure in 1951, the collection would be presented without a formal exhibition schedule. It seemed like a slow-down, but the truth was more complex. If art brut was an engine for Dubuffet’s own artistic practice, it also took up too much of his time. The artist had simply decided to concentrate on his own oeuvre.There was, however, to be one final moment. In January 1951, Dubuffet organised an exhibition of five artists in northern France. To coincide with this modest presentation, he delivered one of his most controversial speeches: Honneur aux valeurs sauvages. In it, he at-
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tacked the values of Western culture and criticised its misconception of madness. People equated art brut with art of the insane, even Breton himself. The surrealist had gone so far as to declare art brut confusing and redundant. For him, art of the insane was a category in itself, and one whose geography had been thoroughly mapped. Dubuffet countered: no criterion ... justifies the kind of discrimina-tion which labels some art as sane and other art as pathological. The disagreement marked a final rupture between the two men and L’Almanach de l’Art Brut would never to see the light of day. With the pavilion no longer suitable to contain the collection, and with the lack of commitment shown by too many phantom members of La Compagnie de l’Art Brut, Dubuffet closed down the association and brought Le Foyer de l’Art Brut to an end. In the coming months, Dubuffet would move himself and the collec-tion to America, where his professional career as an artist finally took root. Le Foyer de l’Art Brut was now a footnote in art history. Yet its energy would continue to radiate, thanks to its contrary and visionary advocate, a man who would always fight for its discover-ies, insights and truth.
Essay Research
Only in art brut can we find the natural and normal processes involved in the creation of art - and in their purest and most
elemental state.
Jean Dubuffet, 1951
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LES BARBUS MÜLLER
GASTON CHAISSAC
FLEURY-JOSEPH CRÉPIN
ALOÏSE CORBAZ
AUGUSTE FORESTIER
PIERRE GIRAUD
MIGUEL HERNANDEZ
JUVA
AUGUSTIN LESAGE
PASCAL-DÉSIR MAISONNEUVE
LOUIS SOUTTER
ADALBERT TRILLHAASE
SCOTTIE WILSON
ADOLF WÖLFLI
André Breton, philosopher/poet[Robert & Sonia Delaunay, artists]
[Max Jacob, artist/critic]Joseph-Oscar Müller, collector
Jean Paulhan, editor/writerCharles Ratton, gallerist
Henri-Pierre Roché, writerMichel Tapié, critic/musician
Tristan Tzara, artist/poet
Robert Doisneau, photographerOtto Freundlich, artistAlbert Gleizes, artist
Anatole Jakovsky, collector/criticAsger Jorn, artist
André Lhote, artist/criticAime Maeght, gallerist
Jean Paulhan, editor/writerMichel Ragon, critic/historian
Victor Brauner, artistAndré Breton, philosopher/poet
Robert Doisneau, photographerRobert Giraud, poet/writer
Vicomtesse de Gaigneron, galleristMichel Tapié, critic/musician
André Breton, philosopher/poetIsamu Noguchi, designer
Michel Tapié, critic/musician
André Breton, philosopher/poetJean Meyer, patron/spiritualist
Eugène Osty, patron/spiritualist
André Breton, philosopher/poetAndré Lhote, artist/critic
Benjamin Péret, authorJacques Senné, collector
René Auberjonois, artistLe Corbusier, architectHerman Hesse, writer
Jean Giono, writer
Otto Dix, artistOtto Pankok, artist
André Breton, philosopher/poetELT Mesens, artist/gallerist
Roland Penrose, artist/galleristPablo Picasso, artist
André Breton, philosopher/poetCarl Gustav Jung, author/psychotherapist
Dr Walter Morgenthaler, psychiatrist
Dr Alfred Bader, collectorSlavko Kopač, artist
Paul Éluard, poetDr Gaston Ferdière, poet/psychiatrist
Dora Maar, artistPablo Picasso, artist
Gérard Vuillamy, artistRaymond Queneau, poetTristan Tzara, artist/poet
Networks Biographies
Les Barbus Müller(dates unknown, France)Named after the eponymous Swiss collector Josef Müller, Les Barbus Müller refer to a group of volcanic stone carvings owned by Jean Dubuffet, André Breton and Tristan Tzara. These anonymous bearded figures inauguratedle Foyer de l’Art Brut and were considered to be among its most important finds. It is generally considered that there were several authors of these neo-pagan works which likely had some original ritual use.
Marguerite Burnat-Provins(1872-1952, France)A lifetime aesthete, artist and poet, Burnat-Provins was inspired by a unprovoked series of intense imaginings, first experienced in Egypt during an episode of ty-phoid. From 1914 on, she realised these ames parasitaires in a single body of work - Ma Ville - com-prised of some 3,000 drawings of psychic hallucinations, with the subjects often dictating not only their colour and form, but a biog-raphy which would appear on the back of each work.
Gaston Chaissac(1910-1964, France)Chaissac was a farmer, handyman and artist who spent much of his life in rural France. His writing attracted the attention of Jean Paulhan and Raymond Queneau. He went on to produce a sub-stantial body of visual material, including drawings, paintings and sculptures. Chaissac saw himself as a modern folk artist and this is what perhaps led to a rift with Dubuffet, who considered the production too informed simply to be defined as art brut. Aloïse Corbaz(1886-1964, France)The sensual drawings, paintings and murals of the ubiquitous Corbaz were brought to Jean Dubuffet’s attention by Jacque-line Porret-Forel, a young doctor at a Swiss psychiatric clinic. The oeuvre speaks of a mysterious and seemingly autobiographi-cal love-affair, often in the form of books or folded sheets, and features unusual materials such as petals and packaging, delicately sewn into the artwork to create a unique form of collage.
2928 Biographies
Fleury-Joseph Crépin1875–1948, FranceCrépin was a 63-year-old Spiritualist who, like his mentor Victor Simon, had initiated an art practice for the purposes of divine healing. This former plumber claimed that his gridded poin-tillist architectures were guided by heavenly forces and would collectively foster world peace. They achieved their goal when the war ended in 1945. Their maker died just three years later, having produced over 350 paintings.
Auguste Forestier(1887-1958, France)Auguste Forestier began a playful artistic practice after being sec-tioned at the Saint-Alban Hospital for apparently derailing a passen-ger train. There, his modest draw-ings developed into ambitious three dimensional contructs. Using discarded materials, he carved furniture and toys for friends and visitors. Word spread and the soldiers and medallions, mythic bestiary and mighty naval vessels were subsequently snapped up by Pablo Picasso and the Surrealists.
Joaquim Vicens Gironella(1911-1997, Spain)The Catalonian-born Gironella grew up in a family of cork-mak-ers and spent much of his adult life engaged in the profession. After serving in the Spanish Civil War, he began to carve increas-ingly complex reliefs from the material, drawing his ideas from literature, myth and religion. Gi-ronella believed that the organic shape of cork should decide his imagery, an approach which seemed to influence Dubuffet’s own figurative oeuvre.
Miguel Hernandez(1893-1957, Spain)The swirling dreamscapes of this elusive painter were first discov-ered in a Parisian gallery by art critic Michel Tapié. Hernández was a peasant-born anarchist from Spain, whose formative years in Brazil had helped fashionhis radical socialist stance. After a lifetime of frontline activism, Hernández retired to Paris and dedicated himself to painting the memories of his youth and the beloved wife he had lost during their wartime struggles.
Biographies
Hector Hyppolite(1894–1948, Haiti)By trade a shoe-maker and house-painter, Hector Hyppolite was a third-generation voodoo priest - or Houngan - whose chicken-feather paintings of island spirits and rituals were spotted by Dewitt Peters, the American wa-tercolourist who ran Haiti’s only art studio. Fêted and promoted by the likes of André Breton and the Cuban artist Wilfredo Lam, Hyppolite’ s practice soon blos-somed and legend of the Haitian Matisse spread across Europe and America.
Juva (Prince Antonin Juritzky)(1887-1961, Austria)Juva was the nom de plume of a lapsed nobleman and academic, who was also an obsessive collec-tor of curiously-shaped flint stones. The so-called artist presented them as evidence of anthropomorphic pre-cultural making and designed special wooden stands to reveal their meaning via a specific orientation. Although Juva did not fit the archetype of an anti-cultural artist, he remained one of the rar-est and highly prized discoveries in art brut.
Pascal-Désir Maisonneuve(1863-1934, France)Pascal-Désir Maisonneuve was a mosaicist and antiquaire, whose immaculate and satirical shell assemblages formed a caricature cast of royal, political and literary elites. Championed by his friend and collector, the French artist André Lhote, Maisonneuve’s rare and humourous masks would eventually come to symbolise the very essence of La Collection de l’Art Brut.
Augustin Lesage1876-1954, FranceLike his friend, Fleury-Joseph Crépin, Lesage was a healer who was guided by voices to paint the beyond. Although first conceived in private, this former coal miner’s practice developed into a series of public performances. The resulting artworks, some monumental in scale, were littered with overt mystical, religious and historical references, intended to convert the uninitiated and reveal the truth.
3130 Biographies
Louis Soutter(1871–1942, France)Trained in architecture, like his cousin Le Corbusier, Soutter was a professional musican, art educator and polymath, whose increasingly eccentric behaviour led to enforced hospitalisation. In the 1920s Soutter initiated a dense, cross-hatched oeuvre, sometimes filling the margins of published volumes. Following the onset of arthritis, he resorted to finger-painting. These haunted and quasi-religious figures are his most widely known works today.
Adalbert Trillhaase(1858-1936, Germany)Infamous for his inclusion in the Nazi’s Entartete Kunst exhibition of 1937, Trillhaase was a wealthy merchant whose the larger-than-life legend was immortalised by his friend, the painter Otto Dix. Trillhaase’s love of bible and myth translated into his own late-life oeuvre of flattened figures and foreshortened perspectives, more nuanced than those of his so-called naive peers. Trillhaase went on to become a member of Der Blaue Reiter artist group.
Scottie Wilson(1888–1972, Britain)Perhaps it was a nervous tic which inspired the prolific morality scrib-blings of Scottie Wilson, the pen name of Jewish emigre and for-mer thrift store owner, Louis Free-man. His fountain pens sprung to life in middle age and made their devoutly non-commercial owner famous. Lionised by George Mel-ly, the British surrealists and Pablo Picasso, this humble doodler was eventually persuaded to exhibit and sell his artworks at Arcade Gallery and Gimpel Fils.
Adolf Wölfli(1864-1930, Switzerland)The prolific and narcissistic Wölfli is often considered the patron saint of art brut. Jean Dubuffet discovered his work on an investi-gative trip to Switzerland, where he met with Dr Walter Morgen-thaler, the pioneering physician who published a monograph on his patient-artist. Wölfli’s semi-au-tobiographical output was fêted by the Surrealists for its dense indecipherable prose, complex musical annotation and ethnologi-cal influences. Le Foyer de l’Art Brut
courtesy of La Collection de l’Art Brut, Lausanne
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n G
allim
ard
=> a
gree
s to
pub
lish
Les
Cah
iers
de
lʼArt
Bru
t
> A
PRIL
//
rese
arch
JD +
Dr
Jacq
uelin
e Po
rret
-For
el =
> re
sear
ches
Alo
ïse C
orba
z>
OC
TOBE
R //
pub
licat
ions
+ G
allim
ard
JD +
Gas
ton
Gal
limar
d =>
pre
para
tions
for
Les
Cah
iers
de
lʼArt
Bru
t *
JD +
Gas
ton
Cha
issac
=>
com
men
ces
18 y
ear
corr
espo
nden
ce
> JU
NE
- JU
LY /
/ pu
blic
atio
ns +
disc
over
ies
JD =
> w
rites
text
for
Gas
ton
Cha
issac
exh
ibiti
on (
Gal
erie
LʼA
rc-e
n-ci
el, P
aris)
JD +
Gas
ton
Gal
limar
d =>
pub
licat
ion:
Les
Bar
bus
Mül
ler
et a
utre
s pi
èces
JD +
Gas
ton
Gal
limar
d =>
pub
licat
ion
agre
emen
t can
celle
d>
AU
GU
STJD
+ B
rass
aï =
> re
sear
ches
gra
ffiti
for
publ
icat
ion
> N
OV
EMBE
R - D
ECEM
BER
// e
xhib
ition
s +
Gal
erie
Ren
é D
roui
n, P
aris
JD =
> op
enin
g of
exh
ibiti
on: B
arbu
s M
ülle
rJD
=>
Mic
hel T
apié
bec
omes
dire
ctor
of L
e Fo
yer
de L
ʼArt
Brut
Mic
hel T
apié
=>
exhi
bitio
n: H
enri
Salin
gard
es/X
avie
r Pa
rgue
y
> D
ECEM
BER
- MA
RCH
//
Mic
hel T
apié
+ G
aler
ie R
ené
Dro
uin,
Par
isM
iche
l Tap
ié =
> m
akes
Alin
e G
agna
ire/R
ober
t Gira
ud a
ssist
ants
Mic
hel T
apié
=>
exhi
bitio
ns/b
ooks
: Rob
ert V
éreu
x/La
my
+ M
igue
l Her
nand
ez
Mic
hel T
apié
=>
exhi
bitio
n +
book
: Pie
rre
Gira
ud +
Jan
Kriz
ekM
iche
l Tap
ié =
> ex
hibi
tion:
Fle
ury-
Jose
ph C
répi
n
> M
AY
- JU
NE
// A
ndré
Bre
ton
+ di
scov
erie
sJD
=>
mee
ts A
ndré
Bre
ton
+ di
scov
ers
Hec
tor
Hyp
polit
eJD
+ E
LT M
esen
s =>
disc
over
s Sc
ottie
Wils
onJD
=>
disc
over
s Ju
va (P
rince
Alfr
ed A
nton
in J
uritz
ky)
JD +
And
ré B
reto
n/Be
njam
in P
éret
=>
disc
over
s Pa
scal
-Dés
ir M
aiso
nneu
ve>
JUN
E - A
UG
UST
//
exhi
bitio
ns +
Gal
erie
Ren
é D
roui
n, P
aris
JD +
Mic
hel T
apié
=>
exhi
bitio
n: A
ugus
te F
ores
tier/
Jean
ne T
ripie
r/H
einr
ich-
Ant
on M
ülle
r JD
+ M
iche
l Tap
ié =
> ex
hibi
tion:
Juv
a JD
+ M
iche
l Tap
ié =
> ex
hibi
tion:
10
Art
ists
* JD
+ R
ober
t Gira
ud =
> cl
oses
Le
Foye
r de
lʼA
rt B
rut a
t Gal
erie
Ren
é D
roui
n >
SEPT
EMBE
R //
exh
ibiti
on +
Pav
illio
n G
allim
ard,
Par
isJD
=>
re-o
pens
Le
Foye
r de
lʼA
rt B
rut a
t Pav
illio
n G
allim
ard
*JD
=>
mak
es S
lavk
o Ko
pač
dire
ctor
Le
Foye
r de
lʼA
rt B
rut
> O
CTO
BER
// L
a C
ompa
gnie
de
lʼArt
Bru
tJD
+ A
ndré
Bre
ton/
Jean
Pau
lhan
/Cha
rles
Ratto
n/H
enri-
Pier
re R
oché
/Mic
hel T
apié
=>
form
atio
n of
non
-pro
fit L
a C
ompa
gnie
de
lʼArt
Bru
tJD
+ A
ndré
Bre
ton
=> s
tart
s w
ork
on lʼ
Alm
anac
h de
lʼA
rt B
rut *
> O
CTO
BER
- NO
VEM
BER
// r
esea
rch
+ Pa
villi
on G
allim
ard,
Par
isJD
+ C
laud
e-Lé
vi S
traus
s =>
res
earc
hes
priso
ner
art
JD +
Dr
Wal
ter
Mor
gent
hale
r =>
exh
ibiti
on +
boo
k: A
dolf
Wöl
fli
JD =
> ex
hibi
tion
+ bo
ok: J
oaqu
im V
icen
s G
irone
llaJD
+ J
ean
Gag
nebi
n/Ja
cque
line
Porr
et-F
orel
=>
exhi
bitio
n +
book
: Alo
ïse
> JA
NU
ARY
- M
ARC
H /
/ Sl
avko
Kop
ač +
Pav
illio
n G
allim
ard,
Par
isJD
+ S
lavk
o Ko
pač
=> e
xhib
ition
: 20
artis
ts *
JD +
Sla
vko
Kopa
č =>
exh
ibiti
on: J
eann
e Tr
ipie
r/A
ugus
te F
ores
tier/
Hei
nric
h-A
nton
Mül
ler
> A
PRIL
- JU
NE
// S
lavk
o Ko
pač
+ Pa
villi
on G
allim
ard,
Par
isJD
+ S
lavk
o Ko
pač
=> e
xhib
ition
: Ado
lf W
ölfli
JD +
Sla
vko
Kopa
č =>
exh
ibiti
on: 1
0 ar
tists
*
JD +
Sla
vko
Kopa
č =>
exh
ibiti
on +
boo
k: M
igue
l Her
nand
ez
Jean
lʼA
nsel
me
+ Sl
avko
Kop
ač =
> pu
blic
atio
n: H
istoi
re d
e lʼA
veug
le
> JU
NE
- SEP
TEM
BER
// S
lavk
o Ko
pač
+ Pa
villi
on G
allim
ard,
Par
isJD
=>
perm
anen
t exh
ibiti
on: L
e Fo
yer
de l'
Art
Bru
t (un
til S
epte
mbe
r 19
51)
> O
CTO
BER
- DEC
EMBE
R //
exh
ibiti
on +
Gal
erie
Ren
é D
roui
n, P
aris
JD =
> bo
ok: L
ʼArt
Bru
t pré
féré
aux
art
s cu
lture
ls
> SE
PTEM
BER
// G
erm
an tr
avel
sJD
+ W
erne
r Sc
henk
=>
rese
arch
at D
r H
ans
Prin
zhor
n co
llect
ion
+ ho
spita
ls/ps
ychi
atris
tsJD
+ W
erne
r Sc
henk
/D
r vo
n Br
aunm
ülh
=> d
iscov
ers
Eugè
ne G
abrit
sche
vsky
(E
glfin
g-H
aar
asyl
um, B
avar
ia)
> JA
NU
ARY
: exh
ibiti
ons
+ pu
blic
atio
nsJD
=>
exhi
bitio
n: 5
art
ists
* (L
ibra
irie
Mar
cel E
vrar
d, B
éthu
ne)
JD =
> co
nfer
ence
: Hon
neur
aux
val
eurs
sau
vage
s (F
acul
té d
es L
ettre
s, L
ille)
> SE
PTEM
BER-
OC
TOBE
R //
end
of L
e Fo
yer
de lʼ
Art
Bru
tJD
=>
diss
olut
ion
of L
a C
ompa
gnie
de
lʼArt
Bru
t JD
=>
perm
anen
t sep
arat
ion
with
And
ré B
reto
n JD
=>
Le F
oyer
de
l'Art
Bru
t at G
allim
ard
clos
esJD
=>
colle
ctio
n de
part
s fo
r A
mer
ica
19431930s
ART
BRU
T
1944
19451920s
1920s
> 19
22-2
3 //
net
wor
ksJD
+ P
aul B
udry
=>
trav
els
to L
ausa
nne
JD =
> m
eets
Fer
nand
Lég
er/J
uan
Gris
/And
ré M
asso
n
> 19
20-2
1 //
trav
els
JD =
> tra
vels
to A
lgie
rs w
ith h
is pa
rent
s
1946 1947 1948 1949 1950 1951
1945 1946 1947 1948 1949 1950 1951
> 19
30 /
/ bu
sines
sJD
=>
star
ts w
ine
com
pany
in B
ercy
> 19
37 /
/ m
arria
geJD
=>
mar
ries
Emile
Car
lu (
Lili)
> M
ARC
H -
APR
IL /
/ ar
tJD
=>
mak
es a
rt: M
etro
+ J
azz
serie
s>
JULY
//
trave
lsJD
+ L
ili D
ubuf
fet =
> bi
cycl
e tra
vels
acro
ss F
ranc
e
> FE
BRU
ARY
- JU
LY /
/ ne
twor
ks +
art
JD =
> st
udio
visi
ts: R
ené
Dro
uin
+ G
eorg
es L
imbo
ur/J
ean
Paul
han/
Pier
re S
eghe
rsPa
ul E
luar
d/Eu
gène
Gui
llevi
c/Fr
anci
s Po
nge/
Jean
Fau
trier
/Ren
é de
Sol
ier
JD =
> m
akes
art
: Mes
sage
s se
ries
> O
CTO
BER
- NO
VEM
BER
// a
rt +
Gal
erie
Ren
é D
roui
nJD
+ P
ierr
e Se
gher
s =>
illu
stra
tes
book
: Lʼh
omm
e du
com
mun
(Po
ésie
44,
Par
is)JD
=>
Tabl
eaux
et d
essin
s (G
aler
ie R
ené
Dro
uin,
Par
is) +
crit
ical
atta
cks
> JA
NU
ARY
- A
PRIL
//
art +
exh
ibiti
ons
> JD
+ E
ugèn
e G
uille
vic
=> il
lust
rate
s bo
ok: L
es M
urs
(Les
édi
tions
du
Livr
e, 1
950)
JD =
> ex
hibi
tion:
Lith
ogra
phie
s (G
aler
ie A
ndré
, Par
is)>
JUN
E //
art
+ n
etw
orks
JD =
> m
akes
art
: Hau
tes
Pâte
s se
ries
JD =
> st
udio
visi
ts: A
ndré
Mal
raux
/Bal
thus
/Jac
ques
Lac
anJD
+ J
ean
Paul
han
=> v
isits
pat
ron
Flor
ence
Gou
ldJD
+ L
ili =
> vi
sits
Ant
onin
Art
aud
(Rod
ez A
sylu
m)
> SE
PTEM
BER
// n
etw
orks
+ tr
avel
sJD
+ J
ean
Paul
han/
Wol
s/Re
né D
roui
n =>
trav
els
to A
uver
gne
> M
AY
- JU
NE
// e
xhib
ition
sJD
=>
exhi
bitio
n: M
irobo
lus,
Mac
adam
& C
ie (
Gal
erie
Ren
é D
roui
n, P
aris)
Mic
hel T
apié
=>
text
: Miro
bolu
s, M
acad
am &
Cie
(Gal
erie
Ren
é D
roui
n, P
aris)
JD
=>
exhi
bitio
n: J
ean
Dub
uffe
t (Pi
erre
Mat
isse
Gal
lery
, New
Yor
k)JD
=>
publ
icat
ion:
Pro
spec
tus
aux
amat
eurs
de
tout
gen
re (
Gal
limar
d, P
aris)
> JU
LY -
DEC
EMBE
R //
art
+ n
etw
orks
JD =
> m
akes
art
: Pay
sage
s gr
otes
ques
+ P
ortra
its s
erie
sJD
+ G
eorg
es B
raqu
e =>
disc
ours
e on
art
> JA
NU
ARY
- FE
BRU
ARY
//
exhi
bitio
n +
trave
lJD
=>
exhi
bitio
n: J
ean
Dub
uffe
t (Pi
erre
Mat
isse
Gal
lery
, New
Yor
k)JD
+ L
ili D
ubuf
fet =
> tra
vels
to S
ahar
a D
eser
t>
JUN
E //
art
+ e
xhib
ition
sJD
+ L
ili D
ubuf
fet =
> tra
vels
from
Sah
ara
Des
ert
JD =
> se
lls w
ine
busin
ess
> O
CTO
BER
- NO
VEM
BER
// e
xhib
ition
s JD
=>
exhi
bitio
n: P
ortra
its (
Gal
erie
Ren
é D
roui
n, P
aris)
+ p
hysic
al a
ttack
s JD
=>
exhi
bitio
n: L
ithog
raph
s (P
ierr
e M
atiss
e, G
alle
ry, N
ew Y
ork)
> N
OV
EMBE
R //
trav
elJD
+ L
ili D
ubuf
fet =
> tra
vels
to S
ahar
a D
eser
t
> A
PRIL
//
trave
lJD
+ L
illi D
ubuf
fet =
> re
turn
s fro
m S
ahar
a D
eser
t >
NO
VEM
BER
- DEC
EMBE
RJD
=>
exhi
bitio
n: P
aint
ings
and
Gou
ache
s (P
ierr
e M
atiss
e G
alle
ry, N
ew Y
ork)
JD =
> te
xt: L
er D
la C
ampa
ne (L
a C
ompa
gnie
de
lʼArt
Bru
t, Pa
ris)
> M
ARC
H -
APR
IL /
/ tra
vels
JD +
Lili
Dub
uffe
t =>
trave
ls to
Sah
ara
Des
ert
> O
CTO
BER
- DEC
EMBE
R //
pub
licat
ions
+ e
xhib
ition
JD =
> pu
blic
atio
n: A
nvou
aiaj
e pa
r in
nim
besil
ave
c de
zim
age
(Des
jobe
rt, P
aris)
JD =
> ex
hibi
tion:
Des
sins
et p
eint
ures
(G
aler
ie G
eert
van
Bru
aene
, Bru
ssel
s)JD
+ P
aulh
an =
> pu
blic
atio
n: L
a M
étro
man
ie (D
esjo
bert
, Par
is)JD
=>
mee
ts A
lfons
o O
ssar
io/J
acks
on P
ollo
ck
> JA
NU
ARY
- JU
LY /
/ ex
hibi
tion
+ pu
blic
atio
nsJD
=>
exhi
bitio
n: P
aint
ings
: 194
3-19
44 (
Pier
re M
atiss
e G
alle
ry, N
ew Y
ork)
JD =
> ex
hibi
tion:
La
Mét
rom
anie
(G
aler
ie N
ina
Dau
sset
, Par
is)JD
=>
publ
icat
ions
: Lab
onfa
m a
bebe
r pa
r in
bo n
om +
Plu
kife
kler
mou
inko
n ni
voua
> JA
NU
ARY
- M
ARC
H /
/ ex
hibi
tions
+ a
rtJD
=>
exhi
bitio
n: P
aint
ings
(Pie
rre
Mat
isse
Gal
lery
, New
Yor
k)JD
=>
exhi
bitio
n: P
our
conn
aître
mie
ux J
ean
Dub
uffe
t (G
aler
ie R
ive
Gau
che,
Par
is)JD
=>
exhi
bitio
ns: S
ol e
t ter
rain
s +
Tabl
es p
aysa
gées
ser
ies
(Gal
erie
Riv
e G
auch
e, P
aris)
> SE
PTEM
BER
- DEC
EMBE
R //
trav
els
+ ex
hibi
tion
Cle
men
t Gre
enbe
rg =
> su
ppor
ts J
DJD
+ L
ili D
ubuf
fet =
> tra
vels
to A
mer
ica
JD =
> ex
hibi
tion:
Jea
n D
ubuf
fet (
Art
s C
lub
of C
hica
go)
JD =
> le
ctur
e: A
ntic
ultu
ral P
ositi
ons
(Art
s C
lub
of C
hica
go)
de la
sta
tuai
re p
rovi
ncia
l
JD =
> ex
hibi
tion:
63
artis
ts *
*
JD =
> op
enin
g of
Le
Foye
r de
lʼA
rt B
rut
Timeline
3534
* Le Foyer de l’Art Brut
1946 Les Cahiers de l’Art BrutLes Barbus Müller Aloïse Corbaz Fleury-Joseph Crépin Auguste Forestier Heinrich Anton Muller Xavier Parguey Somuk Louis Soutter Adalbert Trillhaase Berthe Urasco Adolf Wölfli
1948 ExhibitionMaurice Baskine Gaston Chaissac Aloïse Corbaz Fleury-Joseph Crépin Pierre Giraud Joaquim Vicens Gironella Miguel Hernandez Jan Krizek Henri Salingardes
1948 L’Almanach de l’Art BrutAlphonse Benquet Louis Capderoque Aloïse Corbaz Fleury-Joseph Crépin Joaquim Vicens Gironnella Miguel Hernandez Hector Hyppolite Dr Charles Ladame Pascal-Désir Maisonneuve Xavier Parguey Heinrich Anton Muller Henri Salingardes Robert Tatin Adalbert Trillhasse Berthe Urasco Scottie Wilson Adolf Wölfli
1949 ExhibitionAloïse Corbaz Joaquim Vicens Gironella Miguel Hernandez Robert Tatin Adolf Wölfli
1949 ExhibitionJean L’Anselme Marie-Louis B. Gaston Chaissac Aloïse Corbaz Paul End Auguste Forestier Miguel Hernandez Heinrich Anton Müller Jeanne Tripier Adolf Wölfli
1949 L’Art brut préféré aux arts culturelsGottfried Aeschlimann Antinéa Benjamin Arneval Aymon Julie Bar. Béguin Alphonse Benquet George Berthomier Ernst Bollin Albino Braz Le Barbare Guillaume Gaston Chaissac Mau-rice Charrieau Aloïse Corbaz Fernand Costa Fleury-Joseph Crépin Joseph Degaudé-Lambert Qadour Douida Gaston Duf Paul End Henri Filaquier Auguste Forestier Willi Otto Gappisch Robert Gie. Pierre Giraud Joaquim Vicens Gironella Gustav Miguel Hernandez Joseph Heuer Aimable Jayet Juliette Élisa Bataille Juva Sylvain Lecocq Stanislas Lib Pascal-Désir Maisonneuve Jean Mar Xavier Parguey Clotilde Patard Raymond Oui Georges Roger Henri Salingardes Jaime Saguer Marguerite Sirvins Somuk Jean Stas Amélie Stern Robert Tatin Jeanne Tripier Berthe Urasco Victor Waedemon Scottie Wilson Adolf Wölfli....................................................................................................The Gallery of Everything would like to thank La Collection de l’Art Brut, Lausanne, for their support with this show, as well as Sophie and Agnès Bourbonnais, Baptiste Brun, Marcel and David Fleiss, Sarah Lombardi, Vincent Monod, Jean-Pierre Ritsch-Fisch, Guillaume Zorgbibe and all those involved in researching Le Foyer de L’Art Brut.
Déborah Couette is an art historian and curator. Publications include Collectionner l’art brut (Albin Michel, 2016). Céline Delavaux is a writ-er and doctor in literature. Publications include L’Art Brut, un fantasme de peintre (Palette, 2010). Couette and Delavaux co-curated Il était une fois l’art brut (Art et Marges Musee, 2014).
Concept James Brett, Déborah CouetteEssay Déborah Couette, Céline DelavauxDiagrams James Brett, Déborah Couette, Meg JonesEdit/Translation James BrettPublication © The Gallery of Everything 2016
....................................................................................................
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Notes
*
Exhibition Lists
3736
....................................................................................................
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Notes
38
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