❘ Arts BY HAZELANN WILLIAMS H AVE you ever wondered what outsider art is? Or wanted to know who defines a piece of art as being ‘outside the norm’? The very term - outsider conjures images of unwanted and somehow less valuable work, which is usually how many people view the art form. But the Museum of Everything, the world’s only wandering space for the undis- covered and untrained artists hopes to change that. Touring Europe and displaying the works of artists such as Sister Gertrude Morgan and Sam Doyle, the curator of the exhibit James Brett refuses to use the term, instead he prefers the term unintentional art. “I don’t talk about outsiders, I take a political stand against it because who is defining the inside?” questioned the founder of the Museum of Everything. “It used to seem cool to me as a teenager. But I gradually realised that what it was saying was something political and complicated. When you are getting to things like disability and race it is wrong to call it out- sider because you are reinforc- ing a sort of segregation. I rad- icalised on a personal level after that and made sure that my exhibits include what is known as ‘black outsider art’.” It would come as no surprise to many who read this article, to know that black artists have often been excluded from many institutions, be it the academies, museums or the higher eche- lons of art history. Although in recent years there has been progress for black artists, such as Frank Bowling’s inclusion to the Royal Academy of Arts – the first black artist to be elected a Royal Academician at the insti- tution. Still according to Brett, there is a tendency by the major art houses to dispossess vast amounts of the world’s popula- tion because they do not fit in their ideals of what it means to be a worthy artist. “My first encounter with ‘out- side art’ was in the southern states of America where 50 per cent of the artists are African American. Their work was mainly labelled folk, they weren’t being celebrated and their work was being ripped off by many artists in the main- stream,” explained the curator. “You can see some sort of visual continuity in the art from black artists, that fail to be embraced in the mainstream cul- ture, and that is probably because of the money that is involved in art and because these artists in the exhibit make art because they feel that they have to not because they want it to get into a gallery. And that is what interests me most, the idea that anyone can call them- selves an artist is quite a demo- cratic notion.” To find out more about The Museum of Everything, visit www.musevery.com OUTSIDE OF EVERYTHING OH HAPPY DAY: A painting by Sister Gertrude Morgan JAMES BRETT: Founder of the Museum of Everything I WAS A BAD BOY: An intimate painting by Sam Doyle New exhibition at the Museum of Everything looks at ‘outsider art’ Nov 2012