Dwight Mackintosh (1906-1999)

Following a brain injury after birth, Dwight Mackintosh was considered as “mentally retarded”. He was first committed at the age of sixteen and spent his almost whole life - next 56 years - in psychiatric centers. He was seventy-two years old when his doctors decided that a life outside of institution could have a beneficial effect on him. At the Creative Growth Art Center in Oakland Dwight Mackintosh found a welcoming place, encouraging the emergence of an important artistic production. Mackintosh’s images centered on the figure - initially he drew only boys. Over the years he gradually introduced new elements, including see-through (x-ray) vehicles, animals, and even a few women. Early model cars and high-buttoned boots of a previous era were images remembered from childhood. Unintelligible writing was often an element of Mackintosh’s drawings, but it was separate from the primary image like so many layers of unraveled yarn floating overhead. His sequences of connected letters moved from left to right as if they were continuous explanatory text, or perhaps one vast sentence or signature. No one, not even Dwight Mackintosh, could tell us what was written. A series of strokes in his later years changed the dynamic of Mackintosh’s images, and the sure, clear, steady line for which he had been known became a dense, echoing ripple. He died in 1999, leaving behind thousands of drawings and an extraordinary legacy. Now one of the most respected “outsider” artists, his work is in the Collection de l’Art Brut in Lausanne, Switzerland, and in many other public and private collections throughout the United States and Europe.