The Story of the Vivian Girls – Henry Darger

The quintessential “outsider artist”, Henry Darger was a reclusive Chicago janitor and the creator of a posthumously-discovered, fantastical text titled The Story of the Vivian Girls, in What is Known as the Realms of the unreal of the Glandeco-Angelinian War Storm Caused by the Child Slave Rebellion, that spans more than 15,000 written pages and hundreds of water-colour illustrations and collage art. The genre of “outsider art” is a relatively recent invention, coined by scholars to categorise artists who lived on the margins of society and developed their practices in complete isolation from the established art world. Darger’s childhood was marked by instability, loss and cruelty. His mother died when he was 4 years old, and after his ailing father was hospitalised, he was sent to a Roman Catholic orphanage. On account of his behaviour, Darger was sent to the Illinois Asylum For Feeble-Minded Children, an environment of abuse and neglect that he made attempts to escape. Darger successfully ran away to Chicago at 17 years old, and found work as a hospital janitor. To the world outside his apartment, Darger’s life varied little from its mundane and uneventful routine over the decades. However, Darger’s apartment was a creative sanctuary, where he spent most of his life meticulously crafting and expanding the universe of the Vivian girls, the seven princesses of a mythical Christian nation. As the epic unfolds, the girls brave battles, conduct daring missions and endure a prodigious amount of torture as they fight for the emancipation of enslaved children in the country of the evil Glandelinians. In order to bring the world of the Vivian girls to life, Darger collected magazines, children’s coloring books, advertisements and other commercial material. He largely traced and collaged figures onto exquisite water-color backdrops, creating sweeping, one-of-a-kind compositions that are coveted by collectors and museums today. In addition to the elaborate narrative and illustrations, Darger’s choice to render the girls with androgynous bodies and small penises has continued to intrigue and mystify critics and viewers, who have tried to find an explanation for them in Darger’s closeted homosexuality. (8) What is certain is that Darger’s magnum opus was about the importance of protecting children’s youth and innocence against the injustice and cruelty of the adult world represented by the Glandelinians. Subjected to horrifying conditions and forced labour in the institutions of his childhood, Darger perhaps found an outlet for processing and healing his trauma in The Story of the Vivian Girls, or means to recapture the innocence that had been stripped from him too soon.