insider/outsider



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The definition of Outsider Art is fraught with issues—as online trolls will attest—and, I will not attempt to define it here. However, to further confuse the issue, I will bring forth a few of what I would call “insider/outsider” artists such as Forrest Bess, Frank Overton Colbert, Ida Jones and John Roeder. Individuals that are hard to pigeonhole and overlap with Outsider, Folk, Self-taught, and schooled artists.

Can an artist be an “outsider” if you they had some instruction, but have a minority’s perspective? Are all outsider artists self-taught? If they spent time in a mental institution are they automatically an “outsider?” Can one be an “outsider” if they were on the fringe of society, but then thrust into the New York gallery scene and continued to create art that was then for resale? As with most things, a case-by-case examination and identification of context is key to aiding any definition (if one must be so defined).

In the following pages, we will present a number of artists and works of art that overlap, transition or fit by context into this insider/outsider scheme. In addition, we will have works by Dilmus Hall, George Morgan, Henry Speller, George Ohr, Eugene Andolsek, Henry Ray Clark and others.


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