Vernacular Visionaries by Annie Carlano (Editor), Caterina Gemma Brenzoni, Susan Brown McGreevy
This book is the catalogue for an exhibition at the Museum of International Folk Art, Santa Fe (October 31, 2003 to summer 2004). Published in association with the Museum of International Folk Art, Santa Fe

Raw Vision Outsider Art Sourcebook by Raw Vision Magazine

The essential guide to Outsider Art, Art Brut, and contemporary folk art. Listings of specialized art galleries, web sites, organizations, publications, museums and exhibitions. Color illustrations.

Raw Creation by John Maizels
From Library Journal: Maizels, editor of Raw Vision, the international magazine on outsider and self-taught art, details the history of this art and its still developing recognition. He also discusses the theories and definitions that have grown up around the works of visionaries, the insane, and other extraordinary artists. He further examines art expressed in mediums outside of the conventional art world and devotes a final section to large-scale visionary environments throughout the world.

The Artist Outsider by Michael D. Hall, Eugene W., Jr. Metcalf, Roger Cardinal (Editor)

Though "Outsider Art" has its roots in the Romantic Movement in 19th-century Europe, the term itself was coined 20 years ago to refer to works created by the insane; it has since been broadened to include the unlikely bedfellows of folk, avant-garde, primitive, and modern art. Although ostensibly covering the same topic, these two offerings have little in common. American Self-Taught , by the authors of American Primitive ( LJ 12/88), is a glossy art book presented in a popular style. Each artist--chosen, the authors unabashedly admit, because he or she has an approach that appeals to them personally--is represented by a one-page biography and several works reproduced in lavish color plates. A short introductory essay defines outsider art as "the recovery of a lost world" or, in other words, the harnessing of a primal, often visionary, creative impulse. The contributors to The Artist Outsider , by contrast, spend nearly 300 pages supporting, redefining, and debunking the concept. The book's 19 scholarly essays represent various academic disciplines and are grouped by aesthetic or social approach. They offer an international perspective and critically explore such diverse topics as the role of "insiders" (critics, curators, and dealers), the nature of folk art, the appreciation of difficult art, and art as a tool for the treatment of mental illness. While American Self-Taught is visually thrilling, The Artist Outsider offers provocative food for thought to all who deal with art history. Both are highly recommended for all large art collections; The Artist Outsider is essential for academic collections.
- Kathy Johnson

Everyday Genius : Self-Taught Art and the Culture of Authenticity
(Hardcover)

From Henry Darger's elaborate paintings of young girls caught in a vicious war to the sacred art of the Reverend Howard Finster, the work of outsider artists has achieved unique status in the art world. Celebrated for their lack of traditional training and their position on the fringes of society, outsider artists nonetheless participate in a traditional network of value, status, and money. After spending years immersed in the world of self-taught artists, Gary Alan Fine presents Everyday Genius, one of the most insightful and comprehensive examinations of this network and how it confers artistic value.

Art Office by Constance Smith, Sue Viders

80+ Business Forms, Charts, Sample Letters, Legal Documents & Business Plans (Paperback)

Adolf Wolfli: Draftsman, Writer, Poet, Composer (Cornell Studies in the History of Psychiatry) (Hardcover)
by Adolf Wolfli, Daniel Baumann (Contributor), Et Al (Contributor), Elka Spoerri (Editor)

The enormous pictorial, literary, and musical work of Adolf Wolfli (1864-1930), the classic master of Art Brut, came into being exclusively during his thirty-five-year internment in a mental asylum. Diagnosed, perhaps wrongly, as a paranoid schizophrenic, Wolfli organized his work into an increasingly grand narrative structure that exerts a profound and lasting impact on readers and viewers with its intense visionary imagery. This is the first book to encompass all of Wolfli's work, including his writings and musical compositions.
The authors approach the phenomenon Wolfli from a variety of perspectives that delineate and clarify the structure of the artist's work and assess its connections to modern art. The chronology and composition of his work are presented in the context of art history. Text analyses bring new understanding to his writing. His cosmic experiences and the elaboration of his number systems are seen in relation to philosophical concepts.
Beautifully designed and lavishly illustrated, this volume traces the path of Wolfli's art on its long road from the asylum to the museum.
From the Publisher
Elka Spoerri is Curator of the Adolf Wolfli Foundation in the Museum of Fine Arts, Berne. She has written five major exhibition catalogs of Wolfli's art, edited his literary oeuvre, and curated sixty exhibits of his work.

Coming Home! by Erika Doss

In the works of many famous self-taught artists, such as Howard Finster and Sister Gertrude Morgan, Biblical themes and imagery abound. How has the Bible inspired these Southern creators?
Examining 125 works of art by more than seventy contemporary folk artists, Coming Home! Self-Taught Artists, the Bible, and the American South accompanies a traveling exhibition organized by the Art Museum of the University of Memphis. The exhibition features painters and sculptors of wide acclaim, including Finster, Sister Morgan, William Edmondson, Clementine Hunter, Joe Minter Elijah Pierce, Robert Roberg, William Thomas Thompson, and Myrtice West.

American Self-Taught Art: An Illustrated Analysis of 20th Century Artists and Trends With 1,319 Capsule Biographies (Hardcover)
by Florence Laffal, Julius Laffal

Book Description
Self-taught art (sometimes called outsider art or folk art) is made up of paintings, drawings, sculptures, assemblages, outdoor constructions and other items created by people who have had little or no formal training in art and who produce (or at least began by producing) art without regard to mainstream recognition or the marketplace. Interest in the field has increased tremendously since the beginning of the 1990s, and there are now several major periodicals, numerous large yearly auctions, and dozens of museums and galleries devoted to the field.

Art Brut by Lucienne Peiry

In the first half of the twentieth century, avant-garde artists in Europe, keen to break with academic tradition, began looking beyond the accepted canons of Western art in a search for new sources of inspiration. "Primitive" art, the drawings of children, the art of the insane, automatism, and graffiti all opened up new avenues of experimentation. One of the key figures in this drive to push back the boundaries of art was leading French artist Jean Dubuffet. At the end of World War II, Dubuffet became interested in the works being produced by patients in psychiatric hospitals and by other social outcasts. He made two fruitful trips to Switzerland, where he discovered Wölfli, Aloïse, and Müller, now recognized as important exponents of what was later to become known as "Outsider Art." In 1948, Dubuffet founded the Campagnie de l'Art Brut in order to extend and document the collections he had recently begun. In 1976, after various adventures, the Collection de l'Art Brut moved to its permanent home in Lausanne.
This carefully researched book traces the history of the concept of Art Brut, which is inseparable from the work and personality of the man who did the most for the appreciation and preservation of these remarkable works. The account is completed by biographical notes on the artists featured and an extensive bibliography. The works reproduced, mostly from the collection created by Dubuffet, have retained their subversive freedom, which continues to fascinate and inspire artists and collectors today.