The theme of my works is coming from “To Live”. Most of them, if anything, are based on “sorrow” and “trouble” around us. Among these sorrow things, I shift my thought to feel a thanks. When I feel a thank, I see a small “dream” near in the future. It is “drawing” for me to make a form from a small dream.
I spend a lot of time watching paint dry which is fine because I consider myself to be, first and foremost, a painter. Experiments in drawing led me to tear paper and arrange found objects, lifting me off the paint surface into collage and assemblage. The arrival of furniture ‘shards’ seemed a natural extension of this process and allowed me to step outside the bounds of academic art. Recovered from alleys and yard sales, the chairs, tables and dressers introduce a human element to, otherwise, complex gestures. They represent a human scale with human references: arms, feet, legs, backs, seats and so on. An anthropomorphic whisper keens behind the work.
During a year spent teaching in Japan, I visited ancient Kyoto several times and loved the wooden artifacts of rice cultivation–splintered and gray–honored in retirement, placed around the wood-and-paper houses, sometimes mounted on the exterior as decoration. The ‘Kyoto’ series with its layered wooden designs owes its origins to this memory. ‘Debris Fields’ differ in that they are created from just one fractured furniture piece, making them bolder, simpler, and more colorful.
. . . which brings us back to the paint. Except for the base coat and a rare touch with a brush, the paint is poured and sprayed; it flows and drools and cracks and oozes. You’d think it would add a chaotic element. Quite the contrary, the paint imposes order while charging the pieces chromatically and emotionally; it creates harmonies or contrasts that give depth to the human gestures.
Debris Field #12 | furniture shards, acrylic/polycrylic | 60″ x 35″ x 8″Debris Field #10 | furniture shards, acrylic/polycrylic | 51″ x 36″ x 10″Kyoto #10 | furniture shards, acrylic/polycrylic on pegboard | 36″ x 36″ x 3″Kyoto #8 | furniture shards, acrylic/polycrylic on pegboard | 72″ x 27″ x 5″
Coming from a severely dysfunctional family which led to group homes and institutionalization in her teenage years, Susan Spangenberg cut her outsider artist teeth at Creedmoor Psychiatric Center’s renown ‘Living Museum’ art rehabilitation program. She was on the vanguard of the ‘Girl Interrupted’ female asylum artist wave that has in twenty years become the new normal, yet Susan has maintained the raw essence of that genre imbued with a twenty-first century sensibility.
Girl In Restraints Looking Through The Seclusion Room Window Girl In Restraints Looking Throughpsychiatric hospital gown, leather, pencil, marker, metal on canvas 2019 (hand sewn) 8″ x 10″Octochrist pencil, text, marker, psychiatric hospital gown, fabric, buttons (hand sewn) on canvas 12″ x 16″Girl In Restraints Visits The Octopi Girl In Restraiacrylic, marker, psychiatric hospital gown, fabric, buttons on unstretched canvas 2021 (hand sewn) 72″ x 20″Girl In A Straitjacket pencil, marker, fabric on canvas (hand sewn) 8″ x 10″
As a self taught artist I never learned the “proper” way to make art. My paintings are often inspired by mundane things such as looking at patterns of cracks on a sidewalk or the colors of sprinkles on a donut. My style ranges from geometric art to naive art. I am always looking to find my “inner child” while painting.
As a self taught artist I never learned the “proper” way to make art. My paintings are often inspired by mundane things such as looking at patterns of cracks on a sidewalk or the colors of sprinkles on a donut. My style ranges from geometric art to naive art. I am always looking to find my “inner child” while painting.
I have exhibited in a number of galleries which include Van Der Plas Gallery, 440 Gallery, SITE Gallery, and Greenpoint Gallery in New York City, La Galleria Pall Mall in London and Chie Gallery in Milan Italy. I have also exhibited in Saatchi-The other Art Fair in Chicago and will be exhibiting at the Saatchi fair later this Spring in Los Angeles.
Chicago Boogie | Acrylic on Canvas | 36 x 36 x 1.5Dancing Raindrops #2 | Acrylic on canvas | 36 x 36 x 1.5Colors and Curves | Acrylic on Canvas | 24 x 24 x 1.5Adventures in Geometry #4 | Acrylic on canvas | 24 x 24 x 1.5
I like to create energy and motion by contrasting bright colors, heavy brushstrokes, and unusual shapes and textures.
Many people who view my work tell me it makes them happy. My lack of formal art training has enabled me to think and paint “out of the box” in regards to composition, textures, and colors.
I have been in a number of national and international exhibitions which include Van Der Plas Gallery, SITE Gallery, 440 Gallery, and Greenfield Gallery in NYC, La Galleria Pall Mall in London, and Chie Gallery in Milan Italy. I have exhibited at Saatchgi-The Other Art Fair in Chicago and will be exhibiting in the Saatchi -Los Angeles exhibition in Spring of this year. In 2019 I was one of twenty finalists for the Art Takes Manhattan Competition.
Geschmier #5 | Acrylic on canvas | 40 x 30 x 1.5 (inches)Geschmier #1 | Acrylic on canvas | 12 x 9 x .5Big Bang | Acrylic on canvas | 40 x 30 x 1.5Geschmier #7 | Acrylic on canvas | 12 x 9 x .5 (inches)
Catalan artist and architect, I live and work in Barcelona.
My works try to express social and emotional diversity through the face.
Over the years I have moved between styles and formats, but I have always worked with the same theme: facial portrait. I work mainly with acrylics on canvas and paper, although some pieces are made with charcoal, oil, pastel and inks.
My stylistic influences include abstraction and expressionism. The range of anonymous faces runs on the identity of the characters. I try to express through facial features, looks and gestures, the nuances, complexity and contrasts of the emotional state of the subjects as a reflection of the mood and essential human aspects.
Dream | acrylic on paper | 50x70cmI Won’t Love Anyone Else | acrylic on paper | 50x70cmNew York | acrylic on paper | 50x70cmMelanchoy | acrylic on paper | 50x70cm
Thank you to every artist who submitted artwork for this giant issue of Outsider Art Magazine. Get your art ready because in January 2021 we will be releasing a new call for art. In addition to visual art we will be accepting poetry, short (very short) stories, and interesting articles about artists and their creative journey.
Artists in this Issue
WILD TYPE
Robert Gorchov
Todd Brugman
John McCabe
Robbie Gallows
Dalia Goldberg
Stefan Pruteanu
Magdalena Sikora
Samantha Sadik
Sophie Jacobs
Paulina Klimek-Cornett
Abbott Philson
Nickolai Dostanko
Matthew Clarke
Szilard Juhasz
MRSN
Pracheta Banerjee
Baili Wise
Jimmy Gockel
Nicholas Teetelli
Karen Glykys
Robert Frankel
Charles McDowell
Arne Søvik Larsen
Nicole Sullivan
Hannah Bouchard
Xavier Yarto
Mark Pol Joyce Thornbug
Ian Hartley
Margarita Henriksson
Harrison Ernst
Homer Johnson
Tiantian Ma
Kayle A. Martinez
Rocio Garcia Montiel
Brooke Mathews
Brian Simons
Oliver Quinto
Romero Pasin
Thomas Sciacca
Dawn Rettew
Erik Aleksiewicz
NPrima/Natalia Proskuriakova
Jesus Diaz
Noah Velez
Andrew Stackpole
Gwen Hallford
Barbara Redondo
Anastasiia Kruglova
Jack Oliver
Ken Berman
Monica Tiulescu
Kitty Taylor
Dio D’Brutto
Lisa Castel
Being born in Truth or Consequences has shaped my outlook on life to be a black and white Rube Goldberg machine. I have always studied and been drawn to the Truth.
My work has focused on human struggles with societal pitfalls induced by the conception of morality, and the enforced standards we try and fail to uphold ourselves. Growing up poverty-stricken and at the hands of extreme child abuse, I feel an urgency in addressing these issues and thus issues of morality before true societal progress can be achieved. I believe that what are referred to as the Seven Deadly Sins along with Karma will define the trials and tribulations a person will interact with in their lifetime, and the demons they will struggle with along that path.
My intentions are to spread the word about the struggles within each of us to remain human at all times, and at times, at all cost. Is it okay to help those who admit struggle? Can we be judgmental without being unfair? I want the viewer to understand truths within themselves through my art, to progress and have a life free of burden. I want the viewer to achieve a visual nirvana and ascend to their further purpose.
Being born in Truth or Consequences has shaped my outlook on life to be a black and white Rube Goldberg machine. I have always studied and been drawn to the Truth.
My work has focused on human struggles with societal pitfalls induced by the conception of morality, and the enforced standards we try and fail to uphold ourselves. Growing up poverty-stricken and at the hands of extreme child abuse, I feel an urgency in addressing these issues and thus issues of morality before true societal progress can be achieved. I believe that what are referred to as the Seven Deadly Sins along with Karma will define the trials and tribulations a person will interact with in their lifetime, and the demons they will struggle with along that path.
My intentions are to spread the word about the struggles within each of us to remain human at all times, and at times, at all cost. Is it okay to help those who admit struggle? Can we be judgmental without being unfair? I want the viewer to understand truths within themselves through my art, to progress and have a life free of burden. I want the viewer to achieve a visual nirvana and ascend to their further purpose.
my socks | acrylic on canvas | 34″x61″filth | acrylic on canvas | 18″x21.5″This is What Happens When You’re Away | acrylic on canvas | 20″x20″Daddy’s Fleshlight | acrylic on canvas | 61″x54.5″