Colorado
Roy Smith lives in Royville without electricity or plumbing. During the day he charges solar lights for nighttime use inside the van where he sleeps. In the 1990’s Roy was featured on the television news program 20/20, and he won a racial bias law suite against the police department (in a different Colorado county). […]
Roy Smith lives in Royville without electricity or plumbing. During the day he charges solar lights for nighttime use inside the van where he sleeps. In the 1990’s Roy was featured on the television news program 20/20, and he won a racial bias law suite against the police department (in a different Colorado county). […]
Twisted wire-formed letters near the top spell out “Jesus Cristo,” [slide 1] and sometimes when Dominic ‘Cano’ Espinoza “looks real close” at his castle, he can see the crucified face of Jesus looking back. He built in no such anthropomorphic features, but to him the castle becomes an acheiropoieton – a massive, embossed metal […]
Often self-taught ‘artists’ don’t think of themselves as, or like to be called ‘artists’. They may not produce any ‘for sale’ art objects, their work may be too personal, or it may be intended to carry religious messages from God (for which they accept no personal credit). Many think of themselves as being too unskilled […]
An uninhabitable, monumental shrine, Espinoza started building the castle around 1980. He hauled the “regal” pink exterior wall stone out of the desert in nearby New Mexico, and covered much of the metal-sheathed surfaces with the circular ends of aluminum cans— earning him the nickname: “Cano.” “I just followed where one board ends, looking at […]
An uninhabitable, monumental shrine, Espinoza started building the castle around 1980. He hauled the “regal” pink exterior wall stone out of the desert in nearby New Mexico, and covered much of the metal-sheathed surfaces with the circular ends of aluminum cans— earning him the nickname: “Cano.” “I just followed where one board ends, looking at […]
Art environments are typically made by by artists working outside the mainstream of contemporary art. Exposed to the weather and free for public viewing, the environments have little or no connection to the monetized art-object-based realm of galleries and museums. Often the ‘artists’ don’t think of themselves as, or like to be called ‘artists’, their […]
Often self-taught ‘artists’ don’t think of themselves as, or like to be called ‘artists’. They may not produce any ‘for sale’ art objects, their work may be too personal, or it may be intended to carry religious messages from God (for which they accept no personal credit). Many think of themselves as being too unskilled […]
Art environments are typically made by by artists working outside the mainstream of contemporary art. Exposed to the weather and free for public viewing, the environments have little or no connection to the monetized art-object-based realm of galleries and museums. Often the ‘artists’ don’t think of themselves as, or like to be called ‘artists’, their […]
Dickeyville Grotto by Father Matthias Wernerus in Dickeyville, Wisconsin Rudolph Grotto by Father Philip Wagner in Rudolph, Wisconsin Shrine of the Grotto of the Redemption by Father Paul Dobberstein in West Bend, Iowa St. Peters Rock Grotto by Father Scheier in Farmer, Noirth Dakota
American roadside displays, off-beat curiosities, and yard shows.
American vernacular architecture and hand-painted decorations.