Curated by Jean-Hubert Martin, Lucienne Peiry, Michel Thévoz, and Mattijs Visser

Jean Dubuffet (1901–1985), who amused himself at times by reading the comedies of Terence in the original Latin, nevertheless asserted that he preferred the inventions of art brut to the “parrot-like processes” of “cultural art”—a torturous but fruitful aporia that occupied him for much of his life. The largest show of art brut to date, this exhibition allows comparisons between 117 of Dubuffet’s own artistic productions and those of some fifty brut artists, from the Swiss Aloïse to Henry Darger by way of other less famous but equally enigmatic artists. Also included is a selection of works from the collection largely assembled by German psychiatrist Hans Prinzhorn, author in 1922 of Artistry of the Mentally Ill.

— Jean-Pierre Criqui