A prominent figure on the Austrian and international art scene, since the 1950s Arnulf Rainer has centred his work around existing images: reproductions, photos, his own drawings, and works by other artists including the greatest names in art history. A distinctive working method, this process of appropriation and accumulation overflows into the collection of works by the mentally ill, mediums and outsiders that Arnulf Rainer began in 1963. This collection of art brut – which in 1972 Roger Cardinal translated as “outsider art” – now extends to over 2,000 works, mostly on paper.