On Rhythmistic
Art
The art of Turtel Onli is African Centered. Many who have
seen it appear to be confused by it. The culture conscious African
Americans find it unacceptable because it does not bespeak the “traditional”
Africa that they have come to know and love.
The middle-class find it difficult to accept because it is too African
and not like what they have been told is “good art. The Rhythm & Blues...... Hip-Hoppin’ Black
Americans do not know about him or his work.
As I stated earlier, his work is African-Centered. He has
termed his style Rhythmism. He coined
the term in 1974 and rightly so. The
paintings, wearable art, Graphic Novels. illustrations and performances he creates are alive with RHYTHM. His work is demonstrative in its force. The colors appear to dance before you. The eyes, the lips, the styles of hair pull
you, cajole you, take you in,
The colors are bright, vibrant, steamy as they
vaporize into a thin layer of white heat and back the vibrantly charged
colors. The colors dare you to laugh, to
play, to join in the high energy of life.
Life on a higher plane. Life in a new Africa, a futuristic Africa with a
neo-tradition that does not deny itself but digs down into itself to bare yet a
new fruit for the future. This future fruit,
a Rhythmistic one, is an universal fruit to embellish the entire fabric of
humanity.
Universal is mentioned because the reference to Onli’s
work being African Centered and not generally accepted in that community is due
to its power and influence being misunderstood. There is another community into which Onli
has yet to be accepted and that is the White Art Community.
The disparities between Blacks and Whites and specifically
between White and Black males stumbles blindly over into the Art World. The continuance of this practice inhibits the
flow of contributions by Black artists, creating voids of sterility. This disparity curtails the universals that
we as a culture look for in the world of innovative artists like Onli.
The works of artists like Turtel Onli must be
reviewed because their universals will rhythmically pull at the ancestral memories
that continue to make us human. We can
no longer afford the limitations of Euro-Centric Art as the only contemporary
modernistic approach to unleash the potential power of Art. Onli and his Rhythmistic movement give the
art critics, patrons, and makers the opportunity to expand their concept of the
universal.
1990: Marcia
Hicks, PhD.
