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.


RECENT FEATURES
**ROB OBER: NO IDEOLOGY, PLEASE. THIS ART IS REAL.
“I am suspicious of art informed or directed by ideas or any ideology,” the American artist Rob Ober says. Keeping it real, authentic, shot through with a real pulse, and wildly colorful, Ober’s work feels irresistibly spontaneous and fresh. See. React. Paint. Here, the artist, who grew up all over the place, shares some thoughts about his art. Note to self: We’re in love with those gators. Click here to see article.
**JAMAICAN INTUITIVES: IT’S RAS DIZZY’S WORLD
Ras Dizzy (circa 1932-2008) was one of the most important of the Jamaican Intuitives, a group of self-taught artists whose works began to earn recognition in Jamaica in the late 1970s and notably contributed to shaping a sense of the postcolonial, independent island country’s national cultural identity. A selection of Dizzy’s works from a unique private collection. Click here to see article.
**A BIG, BOLD NEW BOOK: FRANÇOIS JAUVION’S TRIBUTE TO ART BRUT AND OUTSIDER ART MASTERS
In 2020, the French artist François Jauvion’s large-format book L’imagier singulier was published. It featured his own illustrations and texts by various specialists about the lives and accomplishments of numerous art brut and outsider artists. Now, a second volume of Jauvion’s big opus is here. See our overview of L’imagier singulier, Tome 2. Click here to see article.
**ARTIST CATHY WARD: IN LONDON, THE PSYCHIC, SOULFUL MESSAGES OF “THE ORACLES”
Like many art-makers, what with the effects of the coronavirus pandemic period and other concerns, the London-based artist Cathy Ward, who works in various media and genres, has wrestled with numerous, big challenges. Recently, as if purging the negative energy surrounding her, Ward sat down in a corner of her home to create a series of bold, mystical paintings. “They allowed me to reset myself,” she says. See a portfolio of these powerful new pictures. Click here to see article.
**PHOTOGRAPHER JOEL SIMPSON: CAPTURING NATURE’S BIZARRE CREATIVE SPIRIT — AND POWER
The photographer Joel Simpson travels widely in search of unusual natural rock formations and strange textures in the surface of the earth. Here, a selection of new photos from Simpson’s latest expeditions to the Southwest of the U.S.A. illustrates a theoretical approach he has developed to appreciating such striking images. As he notes, it leads viewers “from traditional landscape through abstraction, figuration, and finally to fiction." Click here to see article.
**OFF THE WALL: NEW YORK CITY STREET POETS AND VISIONARIES, THE KENNETH GOLDSMITH COLLECTION
In the 1980s, Kenneth Goldsmith, a poet and university professor, began tearing off anonymously made, handwritten ads, religious-themed proclamations, and oddball declarations that he found posted on walls and lampposts on the streets of New York City. A bemusing selection of such bizarre “poetry” was recently shown at Andrew Edlin Gallery. Click here to see article.
**GENEVA, SWITZERLAND: EMMANUEL HERZ’S JELLYFISH INVASION
Earlier this year, at the café/restaurant Remor in Geneva, Switzerland, we stumbled upon a stunning display of Emmanuel Herz’s festive “Fascinantes Méduses” (“Fascinating Jellyfish”), a group of sculptures and paintings that had taken over the old joint’s ceiling lamps and walls. We were smitten — and maybe also bitten. See out photo-filled report. Click here to see article.
IN WESTERN NEW ZEALAND, PSYCHEDELIA RIDES THE WAVES

From New Zealand, Stuart Shepherd reports on the activities of Acid Mince, a group of young surfers who are self-taught painters, too. They have decorated their surfboards, a café that is one of their regular hangouts, and a range of merchandise that they are selling online — hoodies, T-shirts, and more — with their original designs. Spooky and goofy at the same time, their imagery includes ghoulish faces with multiple eyes, bizarre creatures with serpentine limbs, and trippy, hand-drawn typography. Shepherd, an artist who has closely examined outsider art in New Zealand, celebrates Acid Mince’s delightful irreverence.
Read more
KEEPING SECRETS OF STRANGE THINGS AMONG US

In London, brutjournal’s artist-correspondent Cathy Ward took a break from polishing her crystals to go look in at the newly renovated College of Psychic Studies, an institution that grew out of the London Spiritualist Alliance in the late 19th century and is still in operation today. She spoke with Vivienne Roberts, the College’s curator and archivist, about the unusual institution’s colorful history, the enduring mysteries of mediumistic art, and Spiritualism’s unexpected appeal in this era of a worldwide public-health crisis and rapid developments in communications technology.
Read more
CHASING JEFFREY WOLF, DIRECTOR OF THE NEW DOCUMENTARY FILM, “BILL TRAYLOR: CHASING GHOSTS”

Read more
JEFFREY WOLF TELLS BILL TRAYLOR’S LIFE STORY IN A NEW FILM

Read more
NEW ZEALAND'S PSYCHEDELIC-SURREALIST SURFER-PAINTERS

Coming in September’s inaugural issue: An exclusive, photo-illustrated report from the west coast — the Tasman Sea side — of New Zealand’s northern, main island about a community of self-taught surfer-artists who have been painting their boards and hitting the waves in psychedelic-surrealist style. Cowabunga, mate!
Advertisement

Advertisement
