“Art Brut in America: The Incursions of Jean Dubuffet” remains on view at the American Folk Art Museum

THE NEW YORK TIMES
By Roberta Smith

An untitled 1924 work by Adolf Wölfli (1864-1930), on display in “Art Brut in America: The Incursion of Jean Dubuffet" at the American Folk Art Museum.

NEW YORK---In 1951, Jean Dubuffet decided it was time to introduce his Art Brut collection in the United States. This saga forms a little-known chapter in the history of what Americans now more often call outsider art. But luckily, the American Folk Art Museum has revisited and in part recreated the Ossorio sojourn with the excellent exhibition “Art Brut in America: The Incursion of Jean Dubuffet.” The show is an invigorating crowd of over 160 pieces by 35 artists — including one stupendous large mixed-media drawing, “The Mother in Pink,” (1951), by Ossorio, which resembles a cloud dwelling pre-Columbian goddess. [link]

“Art Brut in America: The Incursions of Jean Dubuffet” remains on view through Jan. 10 at the American Folk Art Museum, 2 Lincoln Square, at Columbus Avenue and 66th Street, Manhattan; 212-595-9533, folkartmuseum.org.