KDOA

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  • Outsider Art Today: A New Home

    Outsider Art Today: A New Home

    Over the past decade or so, much of my longer writing and think-pieces have lived here on this website. I am truly thankful and appreciative of your continued support and engagement with my posts that often (to me) feel like a stream of consciousness!

    However, as my research and thinking have developed, I’ve felt an increasing need for a space that allows for more regular, direct and conversational writing.

    Joanna Simpson, Gum Nut Folk

    For that reason, I am moving much of my blog-style writing away from this website and onto Substack.

    I’ve launched a new series over there called ‘Outsider Art Today’, and rather than occasional blog posts, this series will be an ongoing sequence of (accessible) essays that will be delivered directly to subscribers via email. If you’d like to continue reading my work, and to receive new pieces as they’re published, Substack is now the place to do that.

    The Outsider Art Today series will be a breakdown of my PhD research, week by week. It begins with the historical roots of the term; from Dubuffet’s concept of Art Brut to Roger Cardinal’s introduction of ‘outsider art’ before moving onto the contemporary landscape and the more complex question of whether increased visibility necessarily equates to structural change.

    Alan Doyle

    Over the coming weeks (and months!), I’ll be breaking my research down into accessible, bitesize essays exploring contemporary attitudes to the term ‘outsider art’, the spaces it is allowed to occupy, the role of cultural gatekeepers, and the institutional mechanisms that reproduce exclusion.

    For the forseeable, this writing will live on Substack, and new posts will be shared there rather than on this blog.

    If you’d like to follow along, I’d love you to join me and subscribe (it’s completely free).

    You can have a look at my posts in the series so far and subscribe by clicking here.

    Really looking forward to continuing the conversation with you.

    Just as a note – this website will remain active, and I very much hope it continues to serve as a useful resource: a place to learn more about outsider art and to access information about some of the artists I’ve had the privilege of showcasing over the years.

  • Spaces, Places, People and Processes: launching the research

    Spaces, Places, People and Processes: launching the research

    Why ‘outsider art’ is still on the outside – and what needs to change

    Over the past decade, ‘outsider art’ has been nominated for the Turner Prize, it has been included in Royal Academy summer shows, there have been major exhibitions in UK gallery and museum spaces. Yet, despite this increased visibility, it remains far from fully accepted within the cultural mainstream in this country. My research asks a simple question: why?

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  • The Illusion of Inclusion: introducing the research

    The Illusion of Inclusion: introducing the research

    Following on from my previous post – which was more of an announcement that there will be more posts soon – I want to just further contextualise my research with the hope of identifying for you its purpose and what I hope it is able to achieve. Ultimately, I hope you can find something new or something useful that can help in your advocacy for outsider art or, if you are an artist yourself, can help you understand why your experience of navigating the UK cultural sector may have been particularly challenging.

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  • Researching the art world’s blind spot

    Researching the art world’s blind spot

    Hugest apologies for such a long absence. Life things have been happening over the past couple of years – including (but not limited to!) becoming a parent and getting my head down to finish my PhD. After six long years, I have now finally completed my PhD research and I am really excited to share this with you over a number of posts on this blog. Please do comment or contact me if you’d like to join in the conversation. I’d really like for this to be a shared space to reflect, ask difficult questions and utlimately look towards reshaping the systems and structures that continue to make the UK art world incredibly exclusive.

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  • Launch of new Research Group: Art created historically in mental health settings

    Launch of new Research Group: Art created historically in mental health settings

    I am really pleased to be co-leading a new Research Group on behalf of Outside In for Tate and the Paul Mellon Centre’s British Art Network. The Research Groups typically run for one year, and offer an opportunity for an in depth focus on a particular part of British art history, providing new perspectives and new ways of engaging academically and curatorially with often overlooked areas of history. I am delighted to be co-leading this group with Jo Doll, an Outside In artist and Ambassador, and participant in Heritage Lottery Funded New Dialogues project.

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  • Artist Showcase: The Aitchverse

    Artist Showcase: The Aitchverse

    The latest artist showcase focuses on Cour d’Blax-Neeck’s Aitchverse creations. In this post, Cour d’Blax-Neeck’s responses to questions about their work are accompanied by their renderings of the Aitchverse, which appear in chronological order, representing several of the styles they work in.

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  • No Art World Without Artists: Flipping the Financial Script

    No Art World Without Artists: Flipping the Financial Script

    Apologies for such a break since the last blog post – 2022 is flying by! I’ve been continuing with my PhD research and over the last couple of months I have been interviewing artists who see themselves as facing some form of barrier to the UK mainstream art world. Although I have worked in this area now for over 10 years, I rarely get the chance to sit down one on one with artists and really listen to their story spoken in their own words, so this has felt like a real privilege. The interviews have been incredibly insightful, and I have been struck by how articulate artists have been about the inherent issues embedded within the UK’s cultural system.

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  • Artist Showcase: Michel Meraud

    Artist Showcase: Michel Meraud

    This latest artist showcase brings you the intricate work of self-taught French artist Michel Meraud.

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  • Artist Showcase: Jon Sarkin

    Artist Showcase: Jon Sarkin

    This Artist Showcase features the wonderfully diverse work of American self-taught artist Jon Sarkin. Below, you can read an interview with Jon about his work, or watch him talking about it in a video. Scroll down even further to view a curated selection of Jon’s works and find a link to his website.

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  • Raku Ray Gun Sculptures by West Magoon

    Raku Ray Gun Sculptures by West Magoon

    “I grew up on the Magoon Ranch, outside Lusk, Wyoming, originally homesteaded by my grandfather in 1886. When I was four years old an old sheepherder, by the name of John the Baptist, showed me incredible chains that he carved out of willow. As soon as I saw them I wanted to make them but it would be six or seven more years before I began whittling with a knife and later, building race cars with hollow eggs and plastic model car parts. Around the age of 12, I began building ships in bottles, eventually discovering a technique for connecting the separate pieces by embedding magnets in the wood. This led to building spaceships in bottles and later, carved wooden robots inhabiting chemistry flasks.

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