Outsider Art Fair 2025
Robert Forman, Charles Ritchie, Martin Wilner
February 27 – March 2, 2025
Metropolitan Pavilion
125 W 18th Street
VIP & Press Preview: Thursday, February 27th: 12–6pm
Vernissage: Thursday, February 27th: 6-9pm
Open to the Public:
Friday, February 28th: 11am-8pm
Saturday, March 1st: 11am-8pm
Sunday, March 2nd: 11am-6pm
BravinLee Programs is pleased to participate in the Outsider Art Fair at a critical period in the evolution of the definition of outsider art. Our stand is comprised of work by Robert Forman, Charles Ritchie and Martin Wilner. Their work is visionary, cosmological, precisionist, obsessional, spiritual, and ritualistic. Traditional definitions of the umbrella term Outsider Art continue to be valuable, but in recent years have become more inclusive of art and artists that could be described as Outsiderism.
Robert Forman:
Exploring the interplay between self and surroundings, my art delves into diverse cultures and everyday experiences, merging layers of history, religion, and personal reflection. Employing the meticulous process of gluing thread to board, I shape forms and textures that vividly express my ideas. My intent is to create a lasting impact that resonates with viewers well beyond their encounter with my work.
Charles Ritchie:
Since 1985, I have been drawing from the same window, observing the evolution of a limited group of subjects. Night often permeates my images, comingling the streetscape with the reflection of my studio. I am intrigued with the merging of interior and exterior spaces and the associations that arise. Yet, the pictures begin with the scene and aim to move deeper, beyond what is seen. Often the invisible is what is most evocative and by offering the viewer a context in which essential details are obscured, I leave things open to interpretation. Night is engaged for its obscuring qualities.
Charles Ritchie
Martin Wilner:
My work is an ongoing effort to make sense of things. I may be listening to someone’s dream or what they ate for dinner. I may be drawing my subject as a superhero or rendering a hand holding a telephone receiver. It is in these small things that I hope to discern something about greater existential matters. The answers to big questions are in the small details. This opposition is in keeping with the ways of the unconscious mind, wherein opposites are always related ends of a spectrum. We look outside of ourselves to better understand ourselves. Carl Sagan believed that we exist as a way for the universe to know itself. We correspondingly seek out in the universe a way to understand where we come from beyond the literal stardust of our composition. As an artist and a psychiatrist, I am both outsider and insider, trying to put my mind and my hand to the task of giving meaning to why we are here.