Photo Brut

Jean Dubuffet coined the term "art brut" to describe works--mostly unfiltered expressions of raw and often unstable emotion--created by self-taught artists unrecognized by the dealers, critics, collectors and curators who comprise the art establishment.  Bruno Decharme, a French filmmaker, recognized the term could just as easily be applied to photographers and collagists.  He began acquiring these works and the American Museum of Folk Art exhibited them.  Photo Brut felt like coming home, and not only because it was my first museum visit in more than six months.

Wisconsin's Eugene Von Bruenchenhein obsessively photographed his wife Marie from 1934 to 1950 using various backdrops and props.  She appears to have been as compliant as she was beautiful.  A slideshow of their collaborative effort, some of it R-rated, held me spellbound.

I felt the same way for a much shorter period of time about my friend Florian.

Morton Bartlett, another American outsider whose life spanned the 20th century, created plaster dolls with detachable limbs before photographing his "children" (12 girls and 3 boys) with props, wigs and custom made clothing.

A motorcycle crash nearly killed Dominique Theate just as he was about to enter art school in Belgium.  After brain surgery and a recovery none of his doctors predicted he began drawing his portrait over celebrity photos, including Jane Fonda as Barbarella.

I've been obsessed with both Jane and Barbarella ever since I saw her space suit striptease at the Plaza Theater in El Paso, Texas.

Years later, using a Life magazine cover I rescued from the attic, I screen printed Barbarella on a t-shirt.  I wish only that I'd made dozens more.

Jesus Felipe Consalvos, a Cuban emigre, worked as roller in a cigar factory where he picked up plenty of materials for his geometrically constructed collages.

My collages are more thematic and less precise.

I felt no affinity for Lubos Plny, a Czech "academic model"with a mental health diagnosis. His  thirst for anatomical observation led him to sew his face with a needle and thread, photographing each stage.

Alexander Lebanon, a deaf mute who survived the Soviet era, combined gun-toting self portraiture with symbols of Communist propaganda.  It's hard to decipher his meaning.  He looks like a White Panther to me.

I'm not the only person to find these artists compelling.  Hollywood made a movie ("Welcome To Marwen") about Mark Hogancamp who built Marwencol, a make-believe, scale model World War II-era town after bar patrons nearly beat him to death.  Why? He drunkenly mentioned his fondness for cross-dressing. 

Ichiwo Sugino photographs himself looking like other people and shares the results on his Instagram page.

Move over Cindy Sherman.  "I've been creating self-portraits since 1966 [more than 17,000 to date].  I don't use wigs or tricks, but I use everything that is going on in my body: receding hair, loss of teeth, illness, aging," wrote Tomasz Machcinski, who grew up in Polish orphanages, foster homes and tuberculosis sanatoriums before a friend gave him a Russian camera.