EPISODE · Feb 9, 2023 · 13 MIN
Adolf Wölfli
from The Essay · host BBC Radio 3
Psychologist Professor Victoria Tischler celebrates 'outsider art.' Art created by the marginalised, the untrained, those outside the establishment. She begins with an essay on 'the Picasso of psychotic art' Adolf Wölfli. He called himself The Holy St Adolf the Second, master of algebra, military commander in chief, and chief music director, giant theatre director, captain of the almighty giant steamship and doctor of arts and sciences. Confined to the Waldu asylum in Switzerland for more than half his life, the Surrealist artist André Breton referred to Wölfli’s art as one of the three or four most important bodies of works of the twentieth century.Wölfli's output was prodigious and it's this compulsion to create that Victoria wants to explore - was painting a release from his mental anguish or was the urge part of the torment?
What this episode covers
Psychologist Professor Victoria Tischler celebrates 'outsider art.' Art created by the marginalised, the untrained, those outside the establishment. She begins with an essay on 'the Picasso of psychotic art' Adolf Wölfli. He called himself The Holy St Adolf the Second, master of algebra, military commander in chief, and chief music director, giant theatre director, captain of the almighty giant steamship and doctor of arts and sciences. Confined to the Waldu asylum in Switzerland for more than half his life, the Surrealist artist André Breton referred to Wölfli’s art as one of the three or four most important bodies of works of the twentieth century.Wölfli's output was prodigious and it's this compulsion to create that Victoria wants to explore - was painting a release from his mental anguish or was the urge part of the torment?
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Adolf Wölfli
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