outsider art • art brut • the unclassifiable • the avant-avant-garde
MAY-JUNE 2023
WELCOME TO brutjournal!
SO EXACTLY WHAT ARE WE UP TO HERE?
WELL WE’RE INTERESTED IN FORMS OF ART AND CULTURAL EXPRESSION THAT BREAK THE MOLD; THAT ARE FRESH, DIFFERENT, EXPERIMENTAL, DARING, AND DEFY FAMILIAR LABELS; AND THAT, FOR ALL THEIR INNOVATION OR FAR-OUT FORM, UNABASHEDLY CELEBRATE AND REAFFIRM THE HUMAN SPIRIT.
SOUND GOOD?
For several decades now, the Canadian-born artist Aurora Robson has been “rescuing from the waste stream” all sorts of plastics — bottles, bottle caps, packaging, and more — and using them as the raw material for her environmentally conscious art. She has developed techniques that allow her to create her sculptures without causing more pollution. Her assemblage art-making methods are essentially those of collage — in three dimensions. Seen here: “Plantpocalypse,”
2020, plastic and paper debris on found hard hat, 21 x 19 x 19 inches (55.3 x 48.3 x 48.3 centimeters).
Photo by Marshall Coles
SHIGEKO KUBOTA: VIDEO ART’S OTHER, VERY VISIONARY PIONEER