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Willem van Genk (Born April 2, 1927 in Voorburg; died May 12, 2005 in The Hague) was a Dutch painter and graphic artist, celebrated as one of the leading masters of Outsider Art. Throughout his life he suffered from severe mental distress, experiencing symptoms related to autism and schizophrenia.〔See Ans Van Berkum, "A Bird Above the City," in Patrick Allegaert, Annime Calliau, Ans van Berkum and Bart Amrius, ''Willem van Genk: Building A World of His Own'', Tielt: Lanoo, 2010, pp. 46, 63-64 and the endnote on p. 100.〕 On account of his passion for trains, buses, and train stations, he called himself the "King of Stations".〔Notably, this moniker is the title of the first monograph published on the artist, by his most trusted associate, Dick Walda. (For the evidence that Walda was van Genk's most trusted associate, see Nico Van Der Endt, ''Willem van Genk: Chronicle of a Collaboration'', Amsterdam: Uitgave, 2014, p. 110.) Unfortunately this book is available only in Dutch, and I have relied instead on a critical reading of three Dutch-English dual language texts in the preparation of my text. See my partial bibliography at the bottom of this page. My thanks to Karley Klopfenstein, Valerie Rousseau, and the American Folk Art Museum for making these books available to me.〕 Van Genk’s panoramic cityscapes and fragmented collages express his feelings about modern authority, feelings which were shaped by an abusive father who, in addition to administering his own beatings, left him exposed to a traumatic experience at the hands of the Gestapo during the German occupation of the Netherlands in the Second World War.〔Ans Van Berkum, ''Willem Van Genk: A Marked Man and His World'', Zwolle: Uitgeverij Waanders, 1998, p. 108.〕 Van Genk’s art has been widely exhibited in Europe, where it is also in many museum collections, including those of the Stedelijk Museum, the Dr. Guislain Museum in Ghent, the Collection de l’Art Brut in Lausanne, the Lille Metropole Musee d’Art Modern, d’Art Contemporain et d’Art Brut (LaM), the Croatian Museum of Naïve Art in Zagreb,and the Museum of Everything in London.〔Patrick Allegaert, Annime Calliau, Ans van Berkum and Bart Amrius, ''Willem van Genk: Building A World of His Own'', Tielt: Lanoo, 2010, pp. 4 and 34.〕 ''Raw Vision'', the leading magazine covering Art Brut, ranks van Genk among the “masters of outsider art.”〔Allegaert et al., p. 4.〕 At the beginning of 2005, which would later prove the year of the artist’s death, van Genk’s ''Keleti Station'', now in the collection of the Museum of Everything in London, sold for a hundred thousand dollars at New York’s Outsider Art Fair, thus setting the record for most expensive work ever sold by a living outsider artist.〔Nico Van Der Endt, ''Willem van Genk: Chronicle of a Collaboration'', Amsterdam: Uitgave, 2014, p. 124.〕 On that occasion, Roberta Smith, the chief art critic of The New York Times, praised the piece “as the leading candidate for best in show.” () At least one other critic has identified van Genk as the most important Dutch outsider artist.〔Ans Van Berkum, "A Bird Above the City," in Allegaert et al., ''Willem Van Genk: Building A World of His Own''. Tielt: Lanoo, 2010, p. 37.〕 Van Genk’s first major American exhibition is scheduled for Autumn 2014 at the American Folk Art Museum in New York City.〔()〕 ''Willem van Genk: Mind Traffic'', the first solo exhibition of the artist in the United States, is presented during the fall of 2014 at the American Folk Art Museum in New York City. It “focuses on his creative process, his recurring themes, and the diverseness of his aesthetic,”〔Rousseau, Valérie; Allegaert, Patrick; and Lamot, Yoon Hee, Willem van Genk: Mind Traffic, exhibition brochure. New York: American Folk Art Museum, 2014, p. 4〕 providing, as curators Patrick Allegaert, Yoon Hee Lamot, and Dr. Valérie Rousseau noted, a chronological overview of his oeuvre and a comprehensive understanding of van Genk’s mindset. To complement the presentation of his major artworks, Mind Traffic “includes a selection of documents and objects from van Genk’s living environment: an accumulation of favorite books from his library, handmade maps, personal notes, and his collection of raincoats.”〔 In their published statement, the curators proposed an original perspective: “The artworks can be seen as memory palaces,” as they “depict intricately layered and densely networked urban panoramas and reference interconnectivity.”〔Rousseau, Valérie; Allegaert, Patrick; and Lamot, Yoon Hee, Willem van Genk: Mind Traffic, exhibition’s website, http://folkartmuseum.org/?p=folk&id=12459. New York: American Folk Art Museum, 2014.〕 == Life == 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Willem van Genk」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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