There is an underlying theme of repetition

What does it mean to be an ‘Outsider Artist’? While the majority of famous artists follow the time-tested route from the art school to the gallery, there are those who slip through the cracks of artistic society, exploring their creative visions outside the atelier. The majority of these artists trickle away into obscurity, but this summer, a select group of the outside art world has found a home in London, being displayed in both the Wellcome Collection and the Hayward Gallery.

The term ‘Outsider Art’ originated from the French artist Jean Dubuffet’s idea of art brut, and describes art made outside the structure of the mainstream artistic world, by artists who have often received no formal training. Similar to naive art, outsider art often makes use of improbable perspective, simplistic forms, and bold colours, creating works which are defiantly different to the mainstream artistic culture; the differences are not only in the manner of the work, but also where it is created – most outsider artists do not work out of an official studio, instead working in their home, or as part of therapy.

It is the role of art as occupational therapy that is explored in the Wellcome Collection’s latest exhibition; entitled ‘Souzou’, a Japanese term with no direct translation, but meaning imagination, or creation, it collects work from 46 artists who are attendees and residents at a number of social welfare institutions. Many of these artists have some form of mental disability, but experience the overwhelming desire to create, producing work that reflects their unique world view.
Some of the works, such as Shinichi Sawada’s mythical monsters, bristling with spiky points, come directly from the artist’s imagination, but a large majority relate to everyday objects in the artist’s life. Hiroyuki Komatsu’s clunky cartoons encapsulate episodes and plot arcs of his favourite morning TV shows, while Daisuke Kibushi’s work consists of reproductions of post-war movie posters, meticulously recreated from memory.

These works possibly provide a way for the artist to express what they feel about the world around them; with a alphabet system as complicated as Japanese, it can often be difficult for the artists to articulate what they want to say, and working with media gives them an outlet.

Similarly, it would be untrue to presume that there is a lack of self-awareness on the artists’ part; Yoko Kubota projects her own desires for beauty onto her drawings of models, copied from fashion magazines, while Yukiko Yamada’s series of delicate watercolour portraits, entitled She Is Nobody, can be seen as an existential call to arms, exploring ideas of self-importance, uncertainty, and anonymity. Even Takahiro Shimoda’s pyjamas, festooned with images of his favourite foods, display a keen sense of humour and self-awareness

Throughout the exhibition there is an underlying theme of repetition; since the art is a form of occupational therapy, much of the works centre around a single idea that fascinates the artist. Both Mineo Ito and Ryoko Koda utilise their own names in their works, Ito repeatedly writing it until it becomes a dense scrawl, and Koda refining hers into a single symbol, which she then writes again and again; these works remind me the Infinity Net series by Yayoi Kusama – another Japanese artist who has been institutionalised due to mental illness – in which repeated crescent shapes coalesce to form a net pattern. This repetition is combined with the theme of unorthodox working material in Shota Katsube’s army of miniatures, created from the twist-ties used to fasten bags; each figurine is unique, and minutely detailed, while the sheer scale of the number of pieces make the work quite overwhelming.

While this exhibition shows the role that art can have in the lives of the mentally ill, a role that includes self-representation, actualisation, and personal exploration, if we cross the river we can find another group of outsider artists creating very different works, with completely different roles. The Hayward Gallery’s summer exhibition, entitled An Alternative Guide to the Universe, aims to bring together ‘artists and architects, fringe physicists and visionary inventors’, who can offer “bracingly unorthodox perspectives on the world we live in”. these ideals are lofty, but the exhibition falls short, especially when compared to the sublime collection at the Wellcome, and the previously impressive shows the Hayward has put on.
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