Outsider Art Fair : In-Person and Online

Ricco/Maresca’s larger booth features a group of gouache paintings that are the original artwork for classic American circus posters. These one-of-a-kind maquettes, made between 1925 and 1940, exist at the intersection of circus advertisement and its fascinating artistic potential, which reached its apex between the late 19th century and the mid-20th century.

Originally a duplicate of its European counterpart, the circus in America quickly transcended its antebellum format to become a unique extravaganza inconceivable elsewhere. Scholars link the portable design of the American circus to the country’s vast frontier; its scope to the nineteenth-century expansion of the railroad system, connecting eastern cities to the Wild West; and its broad appeal and flamboyant aesthetic to the wit and grit of some of the nation’s early capitalist trailblazers, who recognized that fantasy was big business.

The works in Ricco/Maresca’s presentation depict many of the emblematic motifs of the three-ring circus and its different acts, as well as more mysterious scenes of lyrical beauty. Their vibrant color combinations, meant to captivate the attention of the average passerby almost a hundred years ago, are remarkably preserved for the viewers of the present in sophisticated compositions still fresh with vigor and theatricality.