The Legendary Raw Arts Festival Heads to Los Angeles for March 2008

The world's most prestigious non-mainstream arts festival ...

IPSWICH, England, Jan. 9 /PRNewswire/ -- The Raw Arts Festival is
dedicated to exhibiting artworks by non-mainstream artists. These artists can
be Outsider, Folk, Raw or Self-taught. Over the years the festival has
exhibited a wide variety of non-mainstream art, such as works created by
homeless people, adults with autism and also famous well established
Outsider/Raw artists etc.
The Festival has been held annually since August 2004, when the first
festival exhibited in London at the Candid Arts Trust in a massive 50,000
square foot gallery located in the heart of London just north of Kings Cross
in Angel. The Festival has come along way since then. It has exhibited at
the Candid Arts Trust again in 2005, Valencia, Spain in October 2006 and New
York, USA in January 2007. In that time, the festival has succeeded in
gaining vast quantities of publicity from many of the major publications
world-wide including Art Fairs International, Metro, New York Arts Magazine,
Raw Vision, The Times, Yahoo news and many others. It has gained widespread
international critical acclaim. The first two festivals have been recognized
as being 'London's largest and best International exhibition of self-taught
art mounted to date.' The 2006 Festival held in Valencia, Spain was
referenced as being 'Spain's first non-mainstream art festival' and the
Festival held in New York was referenced as being the 'First major non-
mainstream arts Festival to offer a fresh alternative to the New York Outsider
Art Fair.'
Many of the artists who have exhibited at the Festival have now become
well-established artists in their own right. The Los Angeles festival is yet
again attracting applications from world-class raw artists. Dover Abrams
(USA) is an artist and co-curator of the infamous Infusion Gallery in Los
Angeles; Akiko Kitami (USA) has exhibited her art works at the prestigious
Ward Nasse Gallery in New York; Franco Meloni (Italy) has exhibited his
artworks worldwide and is due for a stunning solo exhibition at the Broadway
Gallery in New York; and Piers Midwinter (UK) -- the creator and director of
the Raw Arts Festival -- has exhibited his artworks worldwide and has recently
been an artist in residence for a whole month in Beijing, China, at the space
owned by the New York Arts Magazine. Ben Reche (UK) and Brian Steimel (USA)
have also exhibited their artworks worldwide. Brian has participated in the
Carnival of Samhain and Ben has artworks featured on the Saatchi on-line
website. All of these artists have exhibited previously with the Raw Arts
Festival and have received widespread publicity as a result. The Festival is
also exhibiting some exciting upcoming artists such as Beth Cornell (USA), who
has widely exhibited her art in Arizona, USA. Beth grew up with Folk Art all
around her in Pennsylvania and has thus been heavily influenced by self-taught
art.
Los Angeles is an exciting place for the Festival to travel too. It is
well known as being a major centre for Outsider, Folk, Raw, Surrealist and Low
brow art, etc. The extraordinary Watts Towers created by Simon Rodia are
located here. In 1992, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art presented a
groundbreaking exhibition titled 'Parallel Visions.' This traced the
connections between modern artists and their self-taught colleagues. It
played a major role in establishing the field of 'Outsider' art as it exists
today. Los Angeles also plays host to a number of organizations dedicated to
helping non-mainstream artists such as the 'International House of Blues
Foundation' and 'The Los Angeles Craft and Folk Art Museum.'
The Raw Arts Festival 2008 aims to continue the development of raw art in
Los Angeles. In stark contrast to many other Outsider/Raw art exhibitions
which are often organized by art galleries, the Raw Arts Festival offers
artists from all over the world the most prestigious venue for exhibiting
there art without 'strings attached.' Artists are thus free and this has
resulted in some truly glorious art being exhibited and a truly electric
atmosphere being created at the legendary private views. Many artists have
traveled world-wide just to participate in the proceedings and to take away
with them memories of meeting other great artists etc.
The traveling nature of the Festival has ensured that it does not become
institutionalized. More than any other Festival worldwide, the Raw Arts
Festival stays true to its free, spontaneous roots and thus pays homage to the
artists that flock to it. This year, the Festival will exhibit at the
Infusion Gallery, which is located in downtown Los Angeles. The Gallery is
the brainchild of artist/curator Dover Abrams and his wife/artist/gallery
coordinator Jill. It is a reasonably large space located on Los Angeles'
Gallery Row.
As always, the festival has guaranteed widespread publicity for the
upcoming show in March. The show will last for one month. It thus provides
visitors to Los Angeles a good opportunity to see something fresh and to
invest in some highly valuable art.
The Infusion Gallery is located at: 719 South Spring Street, Los Angeles,
California 90014, USA. The show will exhibit from March 2nd to March 26th
2008. The gallery is open from Tuesday through to Saturday, between 12-6 p.m.
For information on the Infusion gallery, please visit: www.infusiongallery.com
For information on the festival and how to apply, please send an e-mail to:
rawartsfestival@yahoo.co.uk
This press release was published in early January 2008 and at the time of
publication, there were still spaces available. The 2008 festival can only
exhibit a limited number of artists and applications are accepted on a first
come first served basis. It is thus recommended that artists wishing to apply
do so quickly.
Artists are responsible for insuring and safely posting artworks to and
from the show.
This press release was issued through 24-7PressRelease.com. For further
information, visit www.24-7pressrelease.com.
SOURCE Raw Arts Festival

Piers Midwinter, 011 48 22 842 3281, piersmidwinter@btinternet.com, for the
Raw Arts Festival