Singular Spaces II: From the Eccentric to the Extraordinary in Spanish Art Environments, Jo Farb Hernández, 5 Continents Editions, 2 volumes of 532 pages each, 1,050 color illustrations, 2023. ISBN: 979-12-5460-018-4. Hardcover, $350 I began my review of Jo Farb Hernandez’s first study of Spanish art environments, 2013’s Singular Spaces, with the observation that is was “so epic that even a large-format volume of nearly 600 pages can’t get the job done, so a bonus CD adds thousands more thumbnail pictures and hundreds more pages of text.” Turns out it wasn’t enough. In the 10 years since that publication, she
Continue readingCategory: Outsider Art
The Poles of D Bill – Near Normal
When D Bill, a retired toolmaker for Caterpillar Tractor, began carving utility poles, it must have seemed natural to him to create detailed engineering drawings for each design. The carvings are whimsical and imaginative, the drawings, technical, detailed and to scale. D Bill, who preferred an initial to his full name Darwin, mostly sold his work at the annual Sugar Creek Arts Festival in the nicely named Normal, Illinois. But he also used it to decorate his spread in Danvers, a few miles west. The poles were scattered around his house and workshop and lined the long driveway up
Continue readingMartha Timm Memorial Rock Garden
The Martha Timm Rock Garden is fenced off in New Hampton, Iowa’s Mikkelson Park, making photography a challenge but visiting easy. You can just walk up any time and look. An information sign supplies what little information I can find about this modestly scaled art environment: “Martha Timm and her husband were retired to a home in New Hampton from a farm southeast of the city when she began the building of her rock garden. It includes rocks from every state of the union, collected by her and for her by relatives and friends in their travels. The shards of
Continue readingPoland: Plenty to Love
I originally wanted to go to Poland as a matter of family heritage. But it turns out there is a ton to like there beyond the ancestral village. Quaint, baroque, modern, lovely, horrifying — the country’s history makes for a rich and varied experience. Click to see.
Continue readingRoadside Poland
Like roadsides everywhere, Poland’s history and culture is spread all along the road, from the folky religious shrines of the countryside to the neon that once lit up its cities. Back to Poland index page
Continue readingStanley Szwarc Early Work
This gallery features a selection of mostly early pieces made by Stanley Szwarc. This work, dating to the 1980s or early 1990s, belonged to the late Rich Bowen, one of Stanley’s principal patrons, and came to me through the generosity of his family. Stanley’s creativity flowered from the beginning. You can see a large collection of his work in the galleries below or read more about Stanley.
Continue readingThe Rainbow Beach Carvings
The revetment and jetty at the south end of Rainbow Beach and adjacent to the northeast corner of the Sawyer Water Plant host more than 700 rock carvings, many made by lifeguards in the 1950s and 60s. These carvings represent a rich record of summer life at the beach as well as including a number of significant individual works of art. It’s also the location with the largest number of identifiable carvers. These galleries feature highlights from the Rainbow Beach carvings. Read the Chicago Lakeshore Art Story
Continue readingThe Morgan Shoal And La Rabida Rock Carvings
Many of Chicago’s oldest lakefront carvings are on the badly deteriorated revetments along Morgan Shoal in Hyde Park. The more than 1,000 carvings there, between 45th and 50th Streets in Chicago’s Hyde Park neighborhood, are in imminent danger of being lost. This section of lakefront is in terrible condition, with many of the old rocks topsy turvy and falling into the lake. The condition of the revetments is such that they cannot be rehabilitated, but that does not mean the rocks and their carvings must be abandoned. The city is proceeding with a project to rebuild and expand the shoreline here,
Continue readingA Joe “40,000” Murphy Update
I believe the first content I posted to this Web site was a piece about Joe “40,000” Murphy, the Chicago usher who created an art environment inside his South Side house and nearby five-car garage. That was in 1994, not long after I had acquired more than 700 pieces of art previously salvaged from Murphy’s property in anticipation of its sale. Murphy had died in 1979. Bits and pieces of the work have been exhibited in the years since then, most notably at Randolph Street Gallery in 1994, Aron Packer Gallery in 1997 (both Chicago) and in a traveling show
Continue readingReview: The Tom Patterson Years
The Tom Patterson Years: Cultural Adventures of a Fledgling Scribe, by Tom Patterson. Hiding Press/Jargon, 208 pages, 10 pages of photographs, 2021. ISBN 9781733709897. Paperback, $18 If you follow the literature of the folk/outsider/self-taught art field, then you know the name of Tom Patterson. He wrote the definitive book about Eddie Owens Martin/St. EOM and Pasaquan, and, with John Turner, the first major book about Howard Finster, among other achievements. Now he’s written a memoir that includes numerous interesting anecdotes from his encounters with Martin, Finster and other figures from the world of folk and outsider art, including the folklore professor
Continue reading