Dan Reeder
When being an outsider means being yourself.
A self-exiled maker of earworms appeals to the child and the grown-up in each of us.
All hail HJ Linderman!
In 1972, art critic Roger Cardinal introduced the term “outsider art” in his book of the same name. The label was his own version of French artist Jean Dubuffet’s earlier art brut — a label describing, in Cardinal’s words, “the only art which can truly be described as inventive, the art engendered outside the influence of society: by those certified insane; by those who claim inspiration from the spirit world; and by the innocent, upon whom the stamp of stereotyped culture has failed to make an impression.” It’s a bit of a flex to be an outsider these days, with society being both intrusively omnipresent as well as something people feel increasingly guilty to be a part of. Everywhere we turn, media personas are peddling ideas, lifestyles, and aesthetics in a nonstop onslaught of suggestion. Our transformation into mirrored mosaics of impersonal impressions, with many (if not most) of us floating unconsciously down a stream of algorithmic slop, is nearly complete. So, in these trying …