Local Playwright Danielle Juzan Premieres Art-World Comedy ‘Artbruted’ at Space 301
Mobile playwright Danielle Juzan's new comedy Artbruted, a witty send-up of the contemporary art world, made its world premiere at Space 301 for a single weekend run in May 2010.
A downtown Mobile gallery scheming to survive, a ghost with a grudge, and an outsider artist who may not exist at all — that was the setup for Artbruted, a new comedy by local playwright Danielle Juzan that premiered this month at Space 301, the performance and exhibition venue operated by the Centre for the Living Arts in the heart of downtown Mobile. The play ran for a short weekend engagement, with performances Friday and Saturday, May 7 and 8, at 8 p.m., and a Sunday matinee on May 9 at 2 p.m.
Tickets were $15, and patrons were directed to reserve seats through Cindy Phillips, the Centre's box office contact, at 251-208-5677 or by email at [email protected].
A Comedy About Art, Money and Deception
Artbruted centers on Marian, the owner of a struggling contemporary art gallery who cannot make rent. With help from the ghost of her deceased business partner, Mark, Marian hatches a scheme: she passes off the sculptures of a local soccer mom as the raw, untutored work of a supposedly illiterate "outsider" artist from the fictional town of Dead Mule, Mississippi.
A local art critic takes the bait, and the plot follows how long the ruse can hold up — and what it costs everyone involved when the truth threatens to surface. According to the Centre for the Living Arts, the play was billed as a witty and thoughtful examination of art's real versus perceived value.
Artbruted was directed by Dr. Ivan H. Davidson, and the cast featured Tracie Collier, Cannon Tucker, Kerri Chimento, Danielle Juzan herself, and Michael Green. The production marked the play's world premiere.
What "Outsider Art" Really Means
The premise of Artbruted plays directly off a real movement in the art world known as outsider art, or by its French name, art brut — literally "raw art." The term was coined by French artist Jean Dubuffet in the 1940s to describe work created by self-taught artists operating entirely outside the traditions and institutions of the mainstream art world: people with no formal training, often working in isolation, sometimes in psychiatric institutions or otherwise on the margins of society.
The English phrase "outsider art" was introduced by British art critic Roger Cardinal, whose 1972 book of that name adapted Dubuffet's idea for English-speaking audiences. The label has since broadened to cover self-taught and visionary artists generally, and the South has been a major source of such work, from Alabama painters such as Bill Traylor and Mose Tolliver to the quilters of Gee's Bend.
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