"Outsider art" is relatively new in Japan and, as a genre, works made by self-taught Japanese artists are still not very well known on the category-delineating, label-loving international art scene.
Now, though, "Souzou: Outsider Art from Japan," an exhibition on view (through June 30) at the Wellcome Collection in London, is calling attention to the innovative creations of dozens of talented, self-taught artists from a country that has long been recognized for its rich history in the fields of design and the visual arts.
Taking its title from a Japanese word that can mean either "creation" or "imagination," depending on which kanji are used to write it, "Souzou" presents more than 300 works made by 46 artists, including paintings, drawings, sculptures, textiles and ceramics. Representing a diverse range of art-making motivations, techniques and themes, it features such unusual confections as Shota Katsube's legions of miniature action figures fashioned from plastic-bag twist ties and Norimitsu Kokubo's drawings of imaginary cityscapes, made with colored pencils and inks on enormous sheets of paper — one is several meters wide.
With your current subscription plan you can comment on stories. However, before writing your first comment, please create a display name in the Profile section of your subscriber account page.