Last year, The New York Times called the Mexican artist Martín Ramírez “simply one of the greatest artists of the 20th century.” What is so remarkable about his achievement, beyond the mesmerizing repetition of lines and images in his drawings, is that all of the work was created inside a mental institution.
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/12/11/art-and-mental-illness/?_php=true&_&_r=0
What are your thoughts? Is the theory correct that mental illness makes an artist or is it that art is therapy for the mentally ill? Is art a way for them to communicate more efficiently? How did the arts become associated with the mentally ill?