Vacanciers 1974

This is "Vacanciers," made with colored markers and light blue vinyl on paper by Jean Dubuffet. What a great title; it makes me want to pack my bags! Just imagine Dubuffet there with his markers and vinyl, cutting and pasting to bring these vacationers to life. The blue sky provides a great setting for these figures, who look like they're pieced together from different shapes and colors. I see such freedom and playfulness in the confident black outlines and unmodulated blocks of red, white, and blue. It reminds me a little of Matisse’s cut-outs, but with a more raw, untamed edge, typical of Dubuffet. I admire how Dubuffet embraced the imperfect, the quirky, and the unconventional. It’s a reminder that art can be found anywhere, in anything, and that sometimes the most interesting things come from the most unexpected places.