Join Jennifer Pinto-Safian, collector and former art brut dealer, Michael Solomon, artist and Alfonso Ossorio’s former assistant, and Hubert Neumann, art collector, to hear stories and anecdotes about the lives of legendary artists Jean Dubuffet and Alfonso Ossorio. Moderated by Dr. Klaus Ottmann, Deputy Director for Curatorial and Academic Affairs, Phillips Collection.
Klaus Ottmann, PhD, is Deputy Director for Curatorial and Academic Affairs at the Phillips Collection in Washington, DC. At the Phillips, he has curated the exhibitions Hiroshi Sugimoto: Conceptual Forms and Mathematical Models; Angels, Demons, and Savages: Pollock, Ossorio, Dubuffet; and Per Kirkeby: Paintings and Sculpture; and oversaw the installation of the Phillips’s new permanent installation, the Laib Wax Room. Dr. Ottmann has curated more than fifty international exhibitions, including Jennifer Bartlett: History of the Universe. Works 1970–2011; Still Points of the Turning World: SITE Santa Fe’s Sixth International Biennial; Life, Love, and Death: The Work of James Lee Byars; and Wolfgang Laib: A Retrospective. His publications include Yves Klein by Himself: His Life and Thought (2010), Thought Through My Eyes: Writings on Art, 1977–2005 (2006), and The Essential Mark Rothko (2003). He is currently working on two forthcoming exhibitions for the Phillips: an exhibition of paintings and sculptures by Dutch artist Karel Appel and a works on paper show with American painter George Condo.
The panel discussion received the support of the American Folk Art Museum’s Council for the Study of Art Brut and the Self-Taught. It is organized in conjunction with the exhibition Art Brut in America: The Incursion of Jean Dubuffet, which was realized in collaboration with the Collection de l’Art Brut, Lausanne, Switzerland.
Image: Aloïse Corbaz (1886–1964), Baptême de Pie XII / Un Baiser à l’aviateur – Le Pape Pie XII monnayeur et son Sphinx sur le siège (Baptism of Pius XII / A kiss to the aviator—Pope Pius XII counterfeiter and his Sphinx on the seat) (double-sided) (detail), c. 1955, colored pencil on a sheet of paper folded in the middle, 59 x 39 3/8 in., Collection de l’Art Brut, Lausanne, Switzerland. Photo © Collection de l’Art Brut, Lausanne, by Olivier Laffely, Atelier de numérisation—Ville de Lausanne.
