“In the Realms of the Unreal” is Henry Darger’s masterpiece. A 15 000 pages novel, which he later transposed to hundreds of paintings. In this imaginary world, seven sisters who go by the name of the Vivian Girls lead the rebellion of enslaved children against adult men. Darger often draws the Vivian Girls naked and sometimes with male genitalia. His obsessive and subversive representation of little girls was often met with backlash, some critics even calling him a paedophile. In this episode, art historian Leisa Rundquist analyses Henry Darger’s portrayal of girlhood as perhaps one of the most misunderstood aspects of his art.

This podcast series was created by Philippe Cohen Solal, written by Clémentine Spiler and produced by César Depouilly for ¡Ya Basta! Records. Illustration : Gabriel Jacquel. Special thanks to Geoffrey Carey for reading excerpts of Henry Darger’s written works.

OUTSIDER is an album by Philippe Cohen Solal & Mike Lindsay featuring Hannah Peel and Adam Glover. 

It’s available here : http://smarturl.it/outsiderdarger

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