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An untitled and undated photograph by Miroslav Tich\u00fd<\/p>\nWhen it comes to making it as an\u00a0artist, most people in the business believe this requires strong financial backing and regular exhibitions. Additionally, artists are usually expected to have learnt their trade at a prestigious art school. That way they have both the educational and economic cushion to be able to make their name in the world.\u00a0Yet, for outsider artists, who are self-taught, amateurish and reclusive, the usual rules don’t apply.
\nWhat’s intriguing about outsider artists, is that, in theory, they could be anyone. Mostly living away from the normal accepted artistic centres, outsider artists achieved their fame through their folk art. It was\u00a0mostly made for themselves, harbouring little desire\u00a0to share it with anyone else. Driven only by their insatiable need to create, their fame was sealed by the remarkable work they left behind. Here at Sleek we have assembled ten of the most famous creators\u00a0of outsider art.<\/p>\n
An untitled and undated photograph by Miroslav Tich\u00fd<\/p>\n
Using only a makeshift camera, the Czech-born Miroslav Tich\u00fd took thousands of pictures of unsuspecting women. He\u00a0quit\u00a0the Prague Academy of Arts due to the communist takeover and lived modestly on a small disability pension. Yet, for over 25 years he managed to build one of the world’s finest collections of photography, pioneering the use of soft focus in the process. It was only due to the good archiving efforts of his friend Roman Buxbaum that his work\u00a0eventually became critically acclaimed.<\/p>\n
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Untitled and undated work by Henry Darger<\/p>\n
Henry Darger was a hospital custodian who secretly created\u00a0hundreds of drawings and watercolour paintings. Mixing Edwardian settings of young girls and mythical creatures with scenes of carnage and war, his paintings are both beautiful and horrific. These paintings were made to accompany his still-unpublished novel T<\/em>he Story of the Vivian Girls.<\/i>\u00a0Unter\u00a0<\/i>15,145 pages, it is by far one of the longest unpublished works ever written. All of this was only discovered by his landlord after his death.<\/p>\n Judith Scott was predicted\u00a0to live only until her teenage years. Born with severe down syndrome, she was left\u00a0in a state institution for over 35 years. Only\u00a0when her sister finally became her legal guardian did\u00a0she discover her artistic talent. Taking a fiber class at the Creative Growth Art Center in Oakland, specially designed for people with disabilities, she was found to have\u00a0a completely original approach to abstract sculpting. By 1999, she crossed over into the world of mainstream art with her first exhibition. The next showcase of her art will be at this years Venice Biennale<\/a>.<\/p>\n She was one\u00a0of thirteen children to a poor sharecropping family and suffered from\u00a0a serious hearing impediment. As a result, her only comfort would be found in drawing. She lived as a gardener for most of her life and\u00a0took up painting after her retirement in the late 70s. Turning\u00a0her small house and garden into what she called a <\/a>“highly public form of spiritual autobiography,” art collectors soon took notice of her great talent. Her spiritual and folk art styles, often celebrating her African origins, has led many critics to compare her to\u00a0Jean-Michel Basquiat<\/a>.<\/p>\n Vivian Maier worked as a nanny, looking after rich kids on Chicago’s North Shore. Yet in her spare time she was a prolific street photographer. She snapped\u00a0everyday scenes of life\u00a0in New York, Chicago and Los Angeles. Her work only became hugely\u00a0popular after her death when a sample of her negatives were\u00a0bought at an abandoned storage unit auction.\u00a0 It is estimated she took over 150,000 photos throughout her lifetime, making any exhibition of her work quite the challenge for curators.<\/p>\n Adolf W\u00f6lfli didn’t have an easy life, but still\u00a0left behind an impressive body of work. This Swiss-born artist was sexually abused as a child and orphaned from the age of ten. Committed to a mental institute for molesting children, he stayed\u00a0there from 1895 until his death in 1930. As a result of his unstable condition he taught himself how to draw \u2014 becoming a pioneer of\u00a0the Art Brut movement. The drawings he left behind are highly complex yet beautiful, incorporating his love for musical notation.<\/p>\n Eugene von Bruenchenhein is the best example of outsider artist as Renaissance man. His work spanned between painting, sculpture, poetry, ceramics, photography and drawing. Using his wife Marie as his muse, he\u00a0would construct elaborate stages to photograph her on. In his own home studio, he managed to create thousands of disparate works of art. Yet, despite multiple\u00a0attempts to sell his work to galleries, it was only after his death in 1983 that his work became better known.<\/p>\n Born illegitimately, the Essex-born Madge Gill was placed in an orphanage at the age of nine. Later she moved to a farm in Canada, before moving back to the UK and marrying her cousin. After the birth of a stillborn girl, she was severely hospitalised for several months as well as becoming blind in the left eye. Recovering from her illness at 38, she started to draw, inspired by a spirit she called “Myrninerest” (My inner rest). Composing thousands of drawings over the next forty years, she never sold her pieces out of fear of upsetting “Myrninerest”. Yet after her death, her work was rediscovered, and now she is considered one of the best outsider artists.<\/p>\n![\"Outsider](\"https:\/\/www.sleek-mag.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/Judith-Scott-825x600.jpg\")
“Untitled,” 2003 by Judith Scott<\/p>\nJudith Scott<\/strong><\/h1>\n
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Marty T. Smith in her yard. Photo Credit: soulsgrowndeep.org<\/p>\nMary T. Smith<\/strong><\/h1>\n
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Undated and untitled photograph by Vivian Maier<\/p>\nVivian Maier<\/strong><\/h1>\n
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“The Ring of the St. Adolf-Fire-Snake, in the Indian Ocean” by Adolf W\u00f6lfli. 1920-1.<\/p>\nAdolf W\u00f6lfli<\/h1>\n
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“Wand of the Genii,” by Eugene von Bruenchenhein. 1956.<\/p>\nEugene von Bruenchenhein<\/h1>\n
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Untitled and undated work by Madge Gill. Courtesy of Henry Boxer Gallery.<\/p>\nMadge Gill<\/h1>\n
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“No Rain, Five Days” by George Widener. 2012.<\/p>\nGeorge Widener<\/h1>\n
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“Untitled,” by Howard Finster. 1990.<\/p>\n