ALOÏSE CORBAZ

Raw Vision, a magazine dedicated to outsider, folk and naive art, is celebrating their 25th anniversary with an exhibition at Halle Saint Pierre in Paris.  The show includes close to 100 artists including familiar names like Henry Darger, Bill Traylor and Shinichi Sawada.  Aloïse Corbaz was new to me and I was struck by both her work and story.  

Aloïs Corbaz (1886 -1964) was Swiss born and, before being committed to an psychiatric hospital, worked as a governess in the court of Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany.  Her obsessive crush on this royal personage lead to her diagnosis of schizophrenia and it is perhaps his regalia clad figure that romances so many of her elegant ladies.  Corbaz' early work was destroyed until the hospital director took an interest and later, the artist Jean Dubuffet included her work in his collection.