Folk Art

"Folk art encompasses art produced from an indigenous culture or by peasants or other laboring tradespeople. In contrast to fine art, folk art is primarily utilitarian and decorative rather than purely aesthetic." (Wikipedia)

"Artistic works, as paintings, sculpture, basketry, and utensils, produced typically in cultural isolation by untrained often anonymous artists or by artisans of varying degrees of skills and marked by such attributes as highly decorative design, bright bold colours, flattened perspective, strong forms in simple arrangements, and immediacy of meaning"

"The visual arts, music, drama, dance, or literature originating from, or traditional to, the common people of a country" (British Dictionary definition)

"Folk art is a result of ordinary people expressing themselves through their creation and construction of utilitarian objects that convey meaning and value to themselves or others within their culture...

...Typically the patterns, motifs, techniques and materials have special significance and can reveal a great deal about a cultural society"

Kate "Granny" Donaldson
Appliqued crochet quilts depicting pastoral/biblical images

• Naive style

• Traditional rules (proportion, perspective) aren't used

• Difficult to describe as it differs according to its culture, geographical location..

• Expresses cultural identity / communities and their values, aesthetics

• Not influenced by fine art / high art / academic definitions of art, however folk artists have been known to make a living.

• Terms that overlap: naive art, primitive art, outsider art, traditional art, tramp art, blue-collar art -> often used interchangeably with folk art

• Reflects diverse community groups: ethnic, tribal, religious, occupational, geographical, age, gender

Man with Facial Paralysis
Jose F. Dos Santos, Brazil | An ex-voto carved offering most likely made

for someone who survived a stroke

What else to look at:

- Crafts, Handicraft, Arts and crafts

- 'Rural crafts' traditional crafts production that is done for simple everyday practical use, argicultural, countryside... (Basket making, basket trap, spinning yarn, thatching..)

- Folk art/crafts of the British Isles? (Knitting? Pottery?)

- American Folk Art Museum / When the Curtain Never Comes Down exhibition

- Folk Art on Encyclopaedia Britannica