The development and reception of the art of marginalized people began in psychiatry. After Cesare Lombroso presented the works of the mentally ill in his book “Genius and Madness” in 1864, there was a long pause. The next work on this topic was written in 1922 by Hans Prinzhorn in his work “Painting of the Mentally Ill”. The patients’ painting, drawing and writing were interpreted as therapy, but not as art. The Nazi dictatorship prevented any further development in that area.

It lasted until 1949. Then, Jean Dubuffet, an artist, collector and wine dealer, first mentioned the term “art brut”, which referred to self-taught artists, including those living in psychiatric clinics, thus describing all those whose works were created in a spontaneous and authentic way, without contact with cultural art. Dubuffet is credited with giving the term Art Brut a positive connotation, at the same time establishing a distance from common names from psychiatric diagnoses such as “art of the mentally ill”, “art of lunatics” and “schizophrenic art”. The representatives of this art, spontaneously and without reflection, take themes, means for their realization and drawing manuscripts from their own inner world, not from the clichés of classical art or any currently relevant art movement.

Back in the 1960s, the Austrian psychiatrist Prof. Leo Navratil discovered the talent of several of his patients at the Gugging Provincial Psychiatric Clinic. He tried to analyse and interpret the drawings and encouraged their authors. Beginning in 1969, he maintained correspondence with Jean Dubuffet and sent him the works of his patients.

The ward where the artists lived was uncomfortably small. In order to create more space, Prof. Navratil placed them in his office where they could draw freely. Togetherness was established during the work. This is especially true for some of these artists, e.g., for Oswald Tschirtner. He needed the presence of a person of a certain sensibility so that he could concentrate better. Drawing and painting were a new possibility to express own ideas. And what they had to say was becoming

visible. The first exhibition of artists from Gugging took place in 1970 nearby Vienna’s St. Stephen’s Cathedral, at the Galerie nächst St. Stephen.

The workplace, shared apartment and exhibition space were combined in 1981 with the opening of the House of Artists in Gugging. The colourful building is located on a hill on the edge of the Vienna Forest, about 20 km north of Vienna, and belongs to the Maria Gugging estate in the township of Klosterneuburg.

After the retirement of Prof. Leo Navratil, Prof. Johann Feilacher shifted the focus to art instead of pathology. At the centre were the personality of individuals and their talent. Exhibitions all over the world followed. In 2005 the Gallery of Artists from Gugging was opened, where their works were exhibited, and the money from the sales belonged to the artists. A year later, the Gugging Museum, a unique Art Brut centre in the world, began its work.

The artists from Gugging, Oswald Tschirtner, August Walla, Johann Hauser, Johann Garber, Heinrich Reisenbauer, Arnold Schmidt, Fritz Kohler, Franz Kernbeis, whose works are on display at this exhibition, are internationally known and recognized. In an emotional sense, their work emanates on the human dimension, without the influence of any other art and technical specialization. The quiet singularity of each individual as well as simplicity are important as the basis of artistic forms.

Loans from this collection are regularly part of the exhibitions at the Gugging Museum. Other focal points of the collection are also on display, showing a closeness to marginal art. An exhibition of borrowed pieces called “Yogini.!”, with about 100 Tibetan thangkas was held in 2012-2013. Tangka is an image on a canvas or silk scroll that is produced in a precisely prescribed manner; it has an important religious function and until recently it was completely unknown in Europe. In these works – the same as in the case of August Walla from Gugging for instance – the great importance of symbolism is recognized; however, it is not primarily a creative expression of the painter, but follows clearly defined iconographic patterns.

In 2021, the exhibition “Naiv.?” at the Gugging Museum, with around 130 works of naïve art from the Infeld Collection, was a huge success. Peter Infeld early recognized the artistic importance of naïve artists. He bought his first paintings in the mid-1960s when he visited the village of Hlebine in Croatia to meet the naïve painters there.

As a collector, Peter Infeld understood the greatness and significance of those who had penetrated the deep darkness of their unconscious to reach the light. Art Brut and naïve art meant the immediacy and untouched beauty of nature to which the human soul also belongs. The opposite of the excessive presence of technicality nowadays is wonderfully illustrated by Oswald Tschirtner’s painted sheet entitled “Praying People” (1987, ink pen drawing on cardboard). This work touches us with its simplicity and spirituality. Tschirtner was turned to himself; his Bible was the only connection with the outside world. His cephalopods, elongated human figures with all four limbs of the same length and without a body, showed a radical simplification. He reduced the form to a minimum, which contributed to the power of his expression. On a white background, with just a few strokes, Oswald Tschirtner lined up his cephalopods one behind the other, all looking in the

same direction. Above the figures, artistically produced without excitement but simultaneously with a lot of love is inscription “People Praying at Church”.

Contrary to Tschirtner is August Walla, a mystic among the Gugging artists and demiurge of his own mythological universe or invented gods. From his earliest youth Walla creatively changed his environment. He carried his painting equipment with him in a suitcase on wheels that he personalized with his handwriting and motifs: trees and benches, walkways, furniture, walls, buildings. His mother was his faithful companion. Since 1983, they both lived in the House of Artists in Gugging, where visitors could see his works at every step. The exhibited drawings in coloured pencils from the 1990s “Madrim, Son of God”, “Aloysia, Dead, Modest Mother” and “Goddess Mary” testify how versatile August Walla was, as a force of nature.

For decades Art Brut Centre Gugging has been considered a magical place where art is synonymous for humanity, sincerity and imagination. It was also a source of inspiration for the musically multitalented David Bowie, who visited the House of Artists during the work on his album “1. Outside” (1995), thus transferring the atmosphere of the visit to the studio.

Scottish fashion designer Christopher Kane enriched his collections with Heinrich Reisenbauer motifs. Famous Austrian artists such as Arnulf Reiner and Peter Pongratz were regular visitors to Gugging.