SVMA Exhibits Emerging “Outsider Art?

Wednesday, 27 September 2006 19:24

SONOMA, CA – The Sonoma Valley Museum of Art (SVMA) will present “Outsider Art: The Creative Necessity” from Saturday, September 9, through Sunday, October 22.  The exhibition will showcase the emerging genre of “art from outside the art world” with paintings, drawings, and sculpture by client-artists of the NIAD Center for Art & Disabilities (formerly National Institute of Art & Disabilities) in Richmond, Calif. On exhibit until 22 October.

Co-curated by Jim Callahan, Sonoma sculptor and past president of the SVMA board of directors, and Gabe Johnson, NIAD director of sales and exhibitions, “Outsider Art: The Creative Necessity” will feature works by Jeremy Burleson, Willie Harris, James Heartsill, Harry Ingram, Rosita Pardo, Beverly “Bubba” Trieber, Vincent Villanueva, Donald Walker, Billy White, and other members of the NIAD Center.

“These artists work obsessively and repetitively,” said Johnson, “whether formally, by mimicking shapes and patterns over and over again, or conceptually, through ideas reiterated and reworked without respite.  Heartsill, for example, has painted the same house day in and day out, year after year.  Harris uses ink to fill page after page with tightly packed circles, overlaying the pattern with an identical yet softer wash.  Their drive to create is unrelenting and their focus is singular.

“The exhibition will bring works of Outsider Art together for a closer look at the creative traits we all share as human beings.  Ways of thinking and seeing are patterns we adopt at a young age and rarely escape, if at all.  We hope to show what motivates and inspires these artists and to draw parallels between the themes that emerge in this collection and the everyday lives of viewers.  These artists appeal to us because they are us.”