Book review Tivaevae: Portraits of Cook Island Quilting
By Lynnsay Rongokea
Photographs John Daley
Published Daphne Brussell Assocs Press Wellington New Zealand
Art institutions are beginning to welcome Outsiders in. But there seems to be a little uncertainty in the art world as to the specifics of the Other guest list: enterprises such as this Artlink special issue are a means of establishing the canon, of packaging the concept.
Disillusioned with the contemptible familiarity of our environment in the South Australian School of Art a group of fellow students and I decided to take our art somewhere else. So, displaced and gung-ho, our controversial creations in tow, we set off to Broken Hill, the self proclaimed art capital of Australia.
Looks at the environment of Bill Sorrell working in the small farming town of Toodyay in the Avon Valley about 80 kilometres from Perth Western Australia.
The popular understanding of the so-called 'insane' artist cannot be summarised better than in the schmaltzy lyrics of 'Vincent' written and sung by Don McLean in the 1970s. He plaintively chides those who misunderstood the living Van Gogh and charges them with the responsibility for his suicide.
Book review The Dictionary of Australian Artists: Painters, Sketchers, Photographers and Engravers to 1870
Edited by Joan Kerr
Oxford University Press Melbourne
RRP $200
Tattoo in Aotearoa/ New Zealand
Tattooing is not 'Outsider' or 'Other' art. To suggest this is to fall once more into the tiresome quagmire of Western art definitions. Looks at an exhibition 'Tattoo' 1993.