Supported Studios: Where Outsider Art Is Made Today

What is a supported studio?

A supported studio is a workspace where artists who face barriers to the art world get the space, materials, time and help they need to make work. The artists might have learning disabilities, autism, mental ill health or a brain injury. Staff, often artists themselves, support rather than teach: the aim is for each artist to develop their own way of working.

Studios also act as a bridge to the art world. They run exhibitions, handle sales, build archives and look after the artists' interests in a market that has not always treated outsider artists fairly. Several of today's most admired self-taught artists came through them.

How did supported studios begin?

The model grew from two directions. In psychiatric hospitals, doctors such as Leo Navratil at Gugging in Austria began encouraging patients to draw in the 1950s. In the community, the closure of large state institutions in the 1970s left many people without day-time support, and some artists and therapists responded by opening studios. Creative Growth in California was one of the first.

What is Creative Growth?

Creative Growth Art Center was founded in 1974 in a garage in Berkeley, California, by the artist Florence Ludins-Katz and the psychologist Elias Katz. In 1978 it moved to a former car repair shop in Oakland, where it still works with around 160 artists with developmental, mental and physical disabilities. Its artists include Judith Scott, whose fibre sculptures have been shown at the Venice Biennale and the Brooklyn Museum, and Dan Miller, shown at the Museum of Modern Art in 2008.

What is Gugging?

Gugging is a village near Vienna where a psychiatric clinic, founded in 1885, became one of the most famous centres of art brut. In the 1950s the psychiatrist Leo Navratil used drawing tests with patients and found remarkable artists among them. In 1981 he set up a Centre for Art and Psychotherapy in a separate building, which his successor Johann Feilacher renamed the House of Artists in 1986. Artists still live and work there, and the museum gugging opened beside it in 2006. Read about the Gugging artists.

Which supported studios are there in the UK?

The UK has a strong network of studios and organisations. A few of the best known:

• Project Ability, Glasgow. Begun in 1983 by Ellie Sinclair-Hall, it works with people with learning disabilities and mental ill health, from studios at Trongate 103.
• ActionSpace, London. Founded in 1984, it supports artists with learning disabilities, with studio spaces including Cockpit Arts and Studio Voltaire.
• Venture Arts, Manchester. A Hulme-based organisation working with learning disabled and neurodivergent artists, now raising funds for a new accessible studio.
• Submit to Love Studios, east London. Run by the brain injury charity Headway East London in a railway arch in Haggerston, it is home to more than 40 artists living with brain injury.
• Bethlem Gallery, Beckenham. A gallery at Bethlem Royal Hospital supporting artists with experience of mental ill health.

The charity Outside In works nationally rather than as a studio. Founded at Pallant House Gallery in Chichester in 2006 and independent since 2017, it gives artists who face barriers to the art world an online gallery, exhibitions and training. You will find these organisations in our where to see directory.

Is studio art really "outsider art"?

This is a live debate. Purists following Dubuffet argue that studio art is shaped by staff, materials and the market, so it is not truly "raw". Supporters reply that the studios simply give artists the basics most trained artists take for granted, and that each artist's vision remains their own. Many studios avoid the outsider label altogether and present their artists as contemporary artists. See the labels debate.

How can you support studio artists?

• Visit studio exhibitions and open days.
• Buy directly from the studio, so the artist receives their share.
• Follow studios online and share artists' work with credit.
• Read our guide to collecting outsider art for what to ask before buying.

Where to go next

Meet Judith Scott and the Gugging artists, or find studios near you in where to see outsider art in the UK.