Ovartaci: The Master Madman

Ovartaci (Louis Marcussen) (1894-1985) is one of the most enthralling Danish artists of the 20th-century. Ovartaci lived at a mental institution from 1929 and to the end of his life. In 1979 his work was presented at the exhibition ‘Outsiders’ at Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Denmark, alongside Adolf Woelfi and others.

Ovartaci worked with papier-mache dolls, magical smoking devices, mechanical objects, with large-scale decoration, on walls and curtains, as well as on the smallest of objects, as well as traditional painting. Ovartaci’s objects and paintings mixes with his personal insights and fantasies to form a swirl of visions. The oeuvre is not only a work of art, but something more. Ovartaci stands for an agitated aesthetic sensibility. I have been one hell of a fantasist , he stated late in his life.

Ovartaci. The Master Madman explores the universe of Ovartaci and analyses the trauma, beauty, and strength of his work and the way he invented a life for himself through art. The book is the first international monograph on Ovartaci, and it is the first research-based book on the artist.