The Google definition of ‘culture’ means the following- ‘the ideas, customs, and social behaviour of a particular people or society’ and also ‘the arts and other manifestations of human intellectual achievement regarded collectively’ while the term ‘Art’ in its most commonly understood sense is ‘the expression or application of human creative skill and imagination, typically in a visual form such as painting or sculpture, producing works to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power.’3 Our understanding and appreciation of culture usually comes from being born and raised in one that provides us with a stable form of collective identity and the safety of groupthink. Though the idea of ‘Art’ has expanded radically over the ages especially in the west, the general perception here is that something is only considered ‘Art’ when it displays high craftsmanship, in the case of objects, or when a skillfully drawn or painted image faithfully reproduces reality and the recognizable, in the case of representational or figurative art. There are reasons for such an exclusive understanding of the visual arts in this country. The first being the fact that the concept of ‘Art’ which centers on the unique vision and approach to expression by the individual is very much a modern western invention that has no precedent in our eastern traditions. What we have are arts and crafts with its inherited forms and motifs which has ceremonial and utilitarian functions. These are not means with which to elevate the personal thoughts and feelings of individuals. In fact, it is the norm of any culture to discourage and suppress the individual in favor of the collective and the status quo. Secondly, the approach to figurative art that was introduced during British rule was probably informed by the Aristotelian concept of art ‘as the realization in external form of a true idea, and is traced back to that natural love of imitation that characterizes humans, and to the pleasure which we feel in recognizing likenesses.’ even though this idea and other traditional understanding of the visual arts entrenched since the renaissance were already challenged rigorously by the Avant Garde that spawned numerous art movements and ‘isms’ over the course of 200 years.

 

Undeniably, art is an expression of the human condition and spirit, and what is presented represents Utopian ideals or projections onto reality in the context or circumstance from where the artists operate; in the cultures of their times. Therefore, it is unsurprising to see many local artists, young and old, reflexively regurgitate the usual tropes, whether in modern or contemporary art forms, reaffirming the truism of the prevalent cultural worldview in which they were raised or operate. However, there is special category of ‘art’ that is diametrically opposite to the outputs influenced by or are the outcome of the cultures of a society according to artist Jean Dubuffet who was the originator of the term ‘Art Brut’ and the founder of what was later to be the Collection de l’Art Brut in Lausanne, Switzerland. In "L’ART BRUT préféré aux ARTS CULTURELS" (Art Brut preferred to Cultural Arts) Dubuffet wrote that ‘By this [Art Brut] we mean pieces of work executed by people untouched by artistic culture, in which therefore mimicry, contrary to what happens in intellectuals, plays little or no part, so that their authors draw everything (subjects, choice of materials employed, means of transposition, rhythms, ways of writing, etc.) from their own depths and not from cliches of classical art or art that is fashionable. Here we are witnessing an artistic operation that is completely pure, raw, reinvented in all its phases by its author, based solely on his own impulses. Art, therefore, in which is manifested the sole function of invention, and not those, constantly seen in cultural art, of the chameleon and the monkey.’

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Art Brut, with its English equivalent, Outsider art (and a handful of related categories) distinguishes the precarious outputs of the untrained from the painfully predictable works churned out by the artistically schooled or conventionally inclined who are perceived rightly or wrongly, to be skillful (and cynical?) producers of cultural commodities with only the market and patrons in mind. Of course, to its detractors Art Brut denote a lack of training, refinement and sophistication, often bordering on buffoonery, lunacy and vulgarity. However, it is this lack of dexterity, absence of pretense, given to impulsiveness and irrationality, like children’s art, graffiti and even the works of the mentally insane that Dubuffet saw as refreshing and authentic in spirit.

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