Ten Bulls version 2 in progress February 11 2014

Catching the Bull    unfinished Feb. 2014     oil on canvas     152.5 X 244 cm  

Taming the Bull    unfinished Feb. 2014     oil on canvas     152.5 X 244 cm 

Onni Nordman’s “Object” stares into the Dal Art Gallery 
(Photo: Ben DuPlessis)

 http://unews.ca/art-show-explores-twists-of-reality/

From  Capture 2014: Nova Scotia Realism  @ Dalhousie Art Gallery, Halifax Nova Scotia  

     OBJECT   2010   oil on acrylic lenticular panels mounted on board   107 X 85 cm

A study of a man contemplating a realization that his mind is just another thing in a world of things. His interiority is only an aspect of the general exteriority.  His subjectivity is no longer his castle.  He's in free fall. 

A famous philosopher gestures around him like cartoon bluebirds around the head of someone clobbered.  

It'll be a rough night.  But I think he'll be okay.

Ten Bulls version 2 in progress January 21 2014

Searching for the Bull   unfinished Jan. 2014   oil on canvas   152.5 X 244 cm

Discovering the Footprints   unfinished Jan. 2014   oil on canvas   152.5 X 244 cm

The point of departure for the 'head' or 'face' motif came from a facial gel mask I found at a yard sale sometime in the late 1990s or early 2000s.  It was meant to be heated or chilled and placed over the face for pleasure or treatment.  When I got it the gel had crystallized inside the blue plastic casing so it was good for nothing, but I thought it might have sculptural possibilities.  It did, however, come with a dozen sheets of high quality tissue die-cut into the shape of the gel mask, to place on your face as a buffer to avoid getting chilled or burned by the gel. 

The tissue sheets could be inked with oil paint made long with linseed oil, and yielded extremely fine-grained impressions.  Eventually I developed the head into other outlines with diverse materials.

The original figuration had a strong, stylized graphic identity with an indefinite ancestry.  It could have come from nearly any culture throughout history.  It could as well have been modelled on a Noh mask as one from Oceania, or Bauhaus sculpture, pre-Colombian ceramic, Slavic design, Inuit or Kwakiutl carving, Byzantine or folk art, the Archaic smile of Ancient Greece.

As it is, it was a pragmatic manufacture design that has now been superseded by different, and more functional designs, making this one a relic.  Albeit a relic of a timeless face. 

In these pictures the face is not a mask or persona, but the matrix which sustains consciousness.

THE WEIGHT No. 5     2011     oil on canvas     122 X 91.5 cm

THE WEIGHT No. 3     2011     oil on canvas     122 X 91.5 cm