THIS IS THE PLACE FOR DISCOVERIES AND DISCUSSIONS OF THE MOST INVENTIVE ART FORMS – ALL KINDS OF ART THAT IS FAR-OUT, FANTASTIC, FREE-SPIRITED, FUN, FUNKY, PHENOMENAL AND GOOD FOR THE SOUL. (MAMA CALLED IT SUI GENERIS)
SUBSCRIBE, BABY. RIGHT NOW!
CONTRIBUTING ARTIST-PHOTOGRAPHER STEVEN HIRSCH HAS SPENT MANY YEARS SHOOTING STREET PHOTOGRAPHY AND SNAPPING PORTRAITS OF CROOKS AND MISFITS IN THE CRIMINAL COURTS FOR NEW YORK’S TABLOID NEWSPAPERS. HE LIKES TO SAY THAT, IN THE CITY WHOSE QUIRKS AND RHYTHMS HE LOVES, HE HAS SEEN IT ALL. BUT HIS LATEST DISCOVERY, IN AN OLD, DOWNTOWN-MANHATTAN BUILDING, BLEW HIS MIND WITH ITS BOLD COLORS AND ODD FORMS. SEE STEVEN’S PHOTO ESSAY, NOW ON THE BIG PAGE.
IN THIS ISSUE, DON'T MISS THESE FEATURES
Editor’s Letter
What the heck is brutjournal?
by Edward M. Gómez
by Edward M. Gómez
Debate
Scott Ogden, a well-known dealer of art made by both schooled contemporary artists and their self-taught peers, owns and runs SHRINE, a gallery with branches in New York and Los Angeles. After many years in the outsider art field, he proposes that the terms “outsider,” “outsider art,” and “outsider artist” should be retired. How might they be holding certain artists back?
Tokyo
The Scottish artist Jack McLean’s art is offbeat, clever, and deeply rooted in keen observation and draftsmanship. Now he is exhibiting a painting that took years to make: “1000 Rockers and One F***ing Bike.”
Discovered in Pennsylvania
The painter Franz Josef Ponstingl (1927-2004) is little known but he created a singular modernist oeuvre: fantastical visions of ancient or otherworldly civilizations, often accented with geometric motifs or abstract passages. At home with the collector who has rescued Ponstingl from obscurity.
MIMI YOUNG: ART ABOUT “HIDING IN PLAIN SIGHT”
Well known as a fashion stylist, the artist Mimi Young also makes paintings, mixed-media works on paper, and assemblage objects. In a new presentation at Pinkwater Gallery in Kingston, New York, she explores abstraction and the theme of “hiding in plain sight.” Free-access article.
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MOMOKO SUZUKI: A PAINSTAKING METHOD — AND THE TEMPTATION OF AN EMPTY WALL
Momoko Suzuki, who is based in Tokyo, employs a meticulous drawing technique. Using only mechanical pencils and erasers, she spends weeks or months executing large-scale abstract works directly on interior walls. We caught her latest solo exhibition — in a most unusual location. Free-access article.
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THROWING DOWN THE GAUNTLET, AN ART DEALER ASKS: “IS OUTSIDER ART DEAD? SHOULD IT BE?”
In Death of an Outsider, its inaugural presentation at its new Los Angeles branch, the New York gallery SHRINE proposed that the terms “outsider” and “outsider art” only serve to prevent certain artists and their creations from receiving the critical attention — and higher-priced sales — they deserve. An interview with SHRINE founder Scott Ogden.
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EVERYDAY REVELATIONS: A PHOTOGRAPHER FINDS ART IN NATURE AND ORDER IN CLUTTER
Have camera, will travel: brutjournal’s visual director, the photographer Bill Westmoreland, has been making springtime outings in the city and in rural settings, where he has reveled in his discoveries of unwitting sculptural forms. A photo portfolio. Free-access article.
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SHIRLEY COHEN: COLOR, HOPE, AND IDEALISM
The self-taught artist Shirley Cohen, who died in 2019 at the age of 97, created abstract and semi-abstract paintings, murals, and experimental works on glass. Informed by the progressivism of the FDR era, her art conveys a spirit of humanism, joy, and aspiration.
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DO THE MATH: HAROLD GRANUCCI’S GEOMETRY = A SELF-TAUGHT ARTIST’S PRECISE VISION
Born in 1916, Harold Granucci worked as an accountant and furniture-store owner; after retiring, he dedicated his time to creating compositions rooted in mathematically modeled patterns. Granucci, who died at the age of 90, left an artistic oeuvre that is still surfacing and was recently presented at the 2023 Outsider Art Fair in New York. Coming soon.
