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Out There!

March 1, 2023 to June 15, 2023

An Online Exhibition of Outsider Art

Indigo Arts didn't exhibit at the Outsider Art Fair this year, but there is plenty to see on our online gallery. The selection of artwork is "Out There", in the geographic as well as the figurative sense. One may prefer to call the art Outsider, Art Brut, Intuitive, Visionary, Naif or Self-taught. Each term has its own advantages and limitations, and some artists fit more comfortably under one name than another. 

These artists also come from outside of the Eurocentric and Americocentric realms that have long dominated the field of Art Brut. The work originates from sources as diverse as villages of Kenya, Tanzania and Nigeria, remote Mexican pueblos, Adivasi settlements in India, and the fringe communities of Havana, Nairobi and Port-au-Prince.

Artists in the Indigo Arts collection include:

Haitian artist Frantz Jacques, who goes by Guyodo, an innovative and charismatic recycler-artist who lives and works in the ruins of Port-au Prince's "Grand Rue".  His work has been shown in New York, Paris and at the Collection de l'Art Brut in Lausanne, Switzerland.  Guyodo works alongside other members of the Atis Rezistans (literally artists of the resistance) and a group of young artists known as the "Timoun Rezistans" (children of the resistance).   Other Haitian recycler sculptors include Kesnard and Davidson Thermidor and the anonymous artists who fashioned helicopters and armored vehicles from plastic milk bottles during the 1994 US-led invasion of Haiti.

Gerard Fortuné, a Haitian painter who worked most of his life out of a few shacks nestled in the woods between two walled compounds of the elite above Port-au-Prince.  A monograph of his work was published a few years before his death in 2019.

Cuban outsider Wayacon, a resourceful mixed media artist in Cienfuegos who fashions art out of whatever he finds.  “Wayacon is a fish that swims in all kind of water, both dirty and clean", he explains.

Three other Cuban artists who found solace in art after major psychological crises:  Damian Valdez Dilla, and Carlos Garcia Huergo work in Havana today, and have shown their work internationally.  Carlos' life and work are featured in "Carlitos' Way", an article in the Spring 2023 issue of Raw Vision.  Mario Mesa (1928 - 2016), who had been either a political prisoner or a mental patient or both in Cuba, arrived in Miami during the Mariel Boatlift of 1980.   Art  programs for the mentally ill in Florida led him to a second career as an artist.  

Kenyan artist Kamante Gatura (1912 - 1985), who found early fame of a sort as the young cook in Karen Blixen/Isak Dinesen's memoir Out of Africa.  Nearly 60 years later his artistic talents were encouraged by the American expatriate photographer Peter Beard.  He illustrated several of Beard's books and produced a large body of drawings of Kikuyu traditions and African wildlife.

"Sane" Mbugua Wadu, a Kenyan self-taught expressionist who early took the name "Sane" as a retort to the many people who pronounced him insane.  Today he has created an art foundation in his home town of Naivasha, where the children of his community receive art lessons.  

Lengisia Lekulen, a Maasai askari or guard who makes delicate pointillistic ink drawings of Tanzanian wildlife.  

Phillip Oluwafemi Babarinlo, a Yoruba artist from Oshogbo in Nigeria.   Long associated with the "Oshogbo school" of post-independence artists, such as Twins Seven-Seven and Asiru Olatunde, he has followed his own path in the US.

Ivorian artist Frédéric Bruly Bouabré (1923 - 2014), an encyclopedic artist who sought to catalog all aspects of his Bété culture and language, and of the world as a whole, in hundreds of index card sized pen and crayon drawings.  How work was featured last year in a retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art, Frédéric Bruly Bouabré:  World Unbound.

Self-taught, naif artists from the countryside outside of Santiago, Cuba, such as Francisco Ravelo Calunga  Angel Llopiz Martinez and Roberto Torres Lameda.

Sign Painters from Haiti and West Africa.

Haitian Koupe Fè artists such as Gabriel Bien-Aimé, who has hammered raw and quirky sculptures out of recycled steel oil drums for over fifty years.  While other artists have followed the lure of production designs for the garden and boutique market, he has persisted with his singular creations.  His work was celebrated in the groundbreaking 1989 show at the Centre Pompidou in Paris,  Magiciens de la Terre.  

Indigenous or Adivasi artists from India, whose innovative work is nurtured by traditional 'tribal" art styles, including Bhil painter Bhuri Bai, Warli artist Shantaram Tumbada and Baiga painter Shagun Devi.

Haitian drapo Vodou artists who have taken the traditional liturgical art of the sequined and beaded Vodou flag far beyond its traditional roots.  Artists include Evelyn AlcideRoudy Azor, Mireille DeliceYves Telemak and many whose works are unsigned.

Jesus Lorenzo and other members of the prolific Lorenzo clan of Guerrero, Mexico, who have followed their late patriarch Lucas Lorenzo, creating small paintings on masonite which blend the folk arts of amaté paintings with the Mexican ex-voto painting.

Pierrot Barra (1942 -1999) a Haitian bizango priest who sold his spectacular mixed media Vodou sculptures out of a booth in Port-au-Prince's old  Marché de Fer.  His works, celebrated in the book, Vodou Things: The Art of Pierrot Barra and Marie Cassaise, are rare today.

La Seisme - 12 Janvier 2010
SKU: DTH-1402

(Port-au-Prince, Haiti)
Recycled wire, steel, mixed metals, paint.
(19" h. x 15" w. x 2 1/2" d.), c. 2013

$475

Red Face
SKU: PAY04

Payas (Haiti)
Oil on canvas (24" x 18")
2002

$ 475

Transformat Coq - Vodou flag
SKU: MES-2001

Port-au-Prince, Haiti.
Sequins and beads on fabric.
(19 3/4” x 12 1/4”) c.2005
Ex collection of Nancy Josephson.

$475

"Rendezvous Chez GRAND PECK" barber sign
SKU: BS-ED-270

Artist unknown, Kinshasa, Zaire (now Democratic Republic of Congo), c.1983
Oil paint on plywood (15" x 30", 38 cm x 71 cm)
c. 1985
Ex. Esger Duintger collection.

$475

Mother and Child (Erzulie Freda)
SKU: GF-2001

(Port-au-Prince)
Oil on canvas (18" x 15"), c.2010.
Ex. collection of Nancy Josephson.

$475

Abel Perez Mainegra
SKU: Mainegra-2

Tempera on paper
(13x9), 2000

$450 framed

Sin Titulo (Nude woman and large animal)
SKU: WAY-2201

c.1997
Oil, wax and mixed media on canvas (11" x 20").

Ex. collection of Jonathan Fisher,
purchased from artist 2000.

$450

Car with a Flat Tire
SKU: BHB-2107

Bhuri Bai - Pitol, Jhabua, Madhya Pradesh State, India
c.2020
Acrylic on paper
(13” x 20” )

$450

Flores de Verano
SKU: FRC1501

(Mella, Cuba)
Acrylic on canvas (12 1/2" x 14 1/2"), 2014
Framed

 

$425 Framed

Phillip Olufemi Babarinlo, Oshogbo, Nigeria
SKU: Oluf-1

2008
Oil on paper (20 5/8" h x 16 3/4"w)

$400

Hair Sign
SKU: bs-253

by Lebene, Togo, c. 1990's
Oil paint on plywood with wood frame (24 " x 17")

$395

Baron - drapo Vodou
SKU: TBT-2202

Attributed to Ceus "Tibout" St. Louis, but could be the work of one of his students, such as Lhérisson Debreus.   
Mixed media:  sequins and beads sewn on fabric (10" x 8”), on wood stretcher.  Features raised design elements by means of stuffing cotton between layers of fabric using "trapunto" technique.  Dated c.1960 per Phyllis Kind Gallery, New York.
Provenance:  Estate of Phyllis Kind.

$375

Tarpa Dance
SKU: SHTB-2105

Warli people, Maharashtra, India.  c.2020
White clay and cow dung pigment painted on cotton fabric.
(18” x 24” on 22” x 28” sheet)

"One of the central aspects depicted in many Warli paintings is the tarpa dance. The tarpa, a trumpet-like instrument, is played in turns by different village men. Men and women entwine their hands and move in a circle around the tarpa player. The dancers then follow him, turning and moving as he turns, never turning their backs to the tarpa. The musician plays two different notes, which direct the head dancer to either move clockwise or counterclockwise. The tarpa player assumes a role similar to that of a snake charmer, and the dancers become the figurative snake. The dancers take a long turn in the audience and try to encircle them for entertainment. The circle formation of the dancers is also said to resemble the circle of life."

$375

Phillip Olufemi Babarinlo, Oshogbo, Nigeria
SKU: Oluf-11

1997
Oil on paper (19 1/2" h. x 12 3/4"w.)

$300

Erzulie Freda Antique Vodou Banner
SKU: VYF-11

Sequins and beads on fabric with fringe
(35" x 35"), mid-20th century.
Note:  Artworks from this collection generally must be shipped from the collection rather than directly from our gallery.  Please allow a few more days for shipment to your location.

 

$ 2,000

Product Status: 
Sold
Bossou Antique Vodou Banner
SKU: VYF-6

Sequins and beads on fabric
(32" x 39"), c. 1980.
Note:  Artworks from this collection generally must be shipped from the collection rather than directly from our gallery.  Please allow a few more days for shipment to your location.

$ 1,600

Product Status: 
ON HOLD
Up-Down Faces
SKU: GBA-2107

Recycled steel oil-drum (24” h. x 24” w. x 2” d.), c.1989.
Ex. collection of Rudi Stern.

$625

Product Status: 
Sold
Girl with Braids
SKU: GBA-2106

Recycled steel oil-drum (20” h. x 25” w. x 2” d.), c.1989.
Ex. collection of Rudi Stern.

$600

Product Status: 
Sold
Large Face in the Foliage
SKU: GBA-2105

Recycled steel oil-drum (23 1/2” h. x 25” w. x 2 1/2” d.), c.1989.
Ex. collection of Rudi Stern.

$575

Product Status: 
Sold
Dos Mamitas
SKU: WAY-0103

Oil and mixed media on cardboard.
(14 x 18).
Framed.

$ 550 framed

Product Status: 
Sold
13 y 17
SKU: WAY-0303

Tempera, mixed media on cotton shirt fabric
(17" x 8 1/4"), c.2000

$450

Product Status: 
Sold
Offering
SKU: Oluf-5

1997
Oil on paper (16" h. x 20 1/4"w.)

$300

Product Status: 
Returned to Artist
Face
SKU: KTL-2201

Cathline.  Grand Rue, Port-au-Prince, Haiti.
Paint and on recycled plywood with rubber inner-tube frame.
(16" h. x 12" w. x 1 1/4" d.), c. 2022

$225

Product Status: 
Sold
Baiga Dancers
SKU: SHD-2006

Shagun Devi -  Baiga people, Madhya Pradesh State, India
2019/2020
Acrylic on paper
(8 1/4" h. x 11 3/4" w. )

Dancers during a Birhanniya festival.

$195

Product Status: 
Sold
Untitled Spirit
SKU: MRO-2305

Cut out recycled rubber inner-tube figures
(12" h. x 5 3/4" w. x 1/4" d.), c.2022

$95

Product Status: 
Sold
Cristo Crucificado
SKU: JL-2101

Jesus Lorenzo
Acrylic paint on masonite w/ clear lacquer.
(12" x 8"), 2019

$68

Product Status: 
Sold
La Virgen de Guadalupe
SKU: JL-2110

Jesus Lorenzo
Acrylic paint on masonite w/ clear lacquer.
(12" x 8"), c.2019

$68

Product Status: 
Sold
White Face
SKU: BH-2001

Bicheton - Timoun Rezistans artist, Grand Rue (Port-au-Prince, Haiti)
Tempera, acrylic on recycled cardboard.
(16 1/4" x 12 1/2”), c. 2019

Price on Request

Product Status: 
Sold
Men in the Village
SKU: JOSG-2001

n.d. (c.1970 - 1980).
Ink, gouache and colored pencil on paper (7" h. x 11 3/4" w.).  Framed.

Price on Request

Product Status: 
ON HOLD
Collecting Fish on the Lake Shore
SKU: JOSG-2003

n.d. (c.1970 - 1980).
Ink, gouache and colored pencil on paper (4 1/4" h. x 8 3/8" w.).  Framed.

Price on Request

Product Status: 
ON HOLD