Self-Made Worlds
Carefully conceived, with respectful, sophisticated essays and excellent color photographs, plus an extensive list of folk-art sites,Self-Made Worldsmay prove indispensable to aficionados of outsider art, and will be educational for those who are new to it. The sites--minutely decorated, handmade, often monumental temples, grottoes, castles, and towers--range from the famous, gracefulPalais Idéalin France, to a Depression-era shack in Louisiana painted with words. Portable outsider art fetches high prices, but as curator Roger Manley writes, all of these obsessive environments, whether about beauty, rage, or sadness, "stem from a deeply felt need for experience that feels honest, authentic, and highly personal."