They make art with their crazy.
July 22, 2012 6:58 PM   Subscribe

I want to read as much as possible on the intersection between art, law and mental illness -- things like the Martin Ramirez case and... what else? What am I overlooking? Thanks in advance.
posted by Ventre Mou to Media & Arts (9 answers total) 7 users marked this as a favorite
 
Could you say more about what you mean? There are disability art shows, and the curators and artists include people with psychiatric conditions/histories/labels, and tend to be from a disability rights framework, which has a connection to law. There are art shows and workshops situated in psychiatric hospitals -- there's a documentary by Jessica Yu (I'm forgetting the name of the film), and lots of related materials (some of which use the term outsider art). But I'm not sure what the connection to law is for those shows/workshops, other than I guess the law/policy question about whether people are over or under hospitalized.
posted by ClaudiaCenter at 8:17 PM on July 22, 2012


Check out the work of Friedrich Schröder-Sonnenstern.
Billy McCune may be of interest too.
The Prinzhorn Collection and Dax Collection are worth researching. ABC Radio National podcasts, parts 1 and 2.
posted by unliteral at 8:30 PM on July 22, 2012 [1 favorite]


Check out the work of Louis Wain and the cat paintings he created, as he progressed into a worse and worse case of schizophrenia.
posted by slateyness at 8:37 PM on July 22, 2012


There is always Henry Darger. Not sure about the law aspect, but were he alive today and trying to show his work he could have gotten arrested, seeing the way things are today.

Caravaggio got into a lot fights and allegedly stabbed someone to death and was running from the law in the early 1600's.

In SanFrancisco and Oakland there are great places that support outsider art.. Creativity Explored in SF and Creative Growth Art Ctr. in Oakland are two really exciting places that support artists who are off the grid, not sure that the artists have legal problems though, as there are strict rules of behavior in the large group studio where the artists work.

Yayoi Kusama has committed herself to an institution for years because of her hallucinations which she depicts to make to paintings, sculpture and installation. I do not think that she ever got in trouble with the law.

Many artists do have brushes with the law though because of drugs, drink and unconventional behavior. That list is quite long.
posted by snaparapans at 9:18 PM on July 22, 2012


Richard Dadd.
posted by misteraitch at 9:49 PM on July 22, 2012 [1 favorite]


In Chicago, Project Onward is housed in a government building (is this what you mean by law? ) and government funded. Also maybe publications or resources from the Intuit Gallery could be useful.
posted by Jason and Laszlo at 11:58 PM on July 22, 2012


There was extensive discussion on a post on the Blue about effects of mental/neurological illness on artist's work.

You might also be interested in the retrodiagnosis of artists (some examples).
posted by James Scott-Brown at 7:44 AM on July 23, 2012




Prison Art
posted by snaparapans at 10:01 AM on July 23, 2012


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