Outsider Art: The Collection of Victor F. Keen
On view through September 7, 2020
Intuit: The Center for Intuitive and Outsider Art
Chicago, Illinios
www.art.org
“Outsider Art: The Collection of Victor F. Keen” features highlights drawn from the collection of the prominent Philadelphia-based art collector. This iconic exhibition showcases one of the premier collections of outsider art in the United States, featuring more than 40 of the genre’s most famous artists, such as Martín Ramírez, George Widener, Lee Godie, Bill Traylor, James Castle and William Hawkins.
Notable about Keen’s collection is its depth and breadth: American and European artists, artists working at workshops such as Gugging, and living artists, including Ken Grimes and George Widener.
Keen began his collection of Catalin radios and outsider art in the ’70s. While he acknowledges the shortcomings of the term “outsider art,” he continues to favor art created by those often placed in this realm: artists making work, often from found materials, created for their own purposes and outside of the commercial art world.
Image: Martín Ramírez (Mexican, active in America, 1895-1963). Untitled (Trains and Tunnels) A, B, (detail), c. 1960-63. Graphite, gouache, crayon and colored pencil on pieced paper, 17 x 78 in. (43.2 x 198.1 cm). Copyright Estate of Martín Ramírez
