Prof. Onli drew this 3ft X 6ft Rhythmistic, grease-pencil on brown kraft paper, treatment in 1975. It was part of a total body of oversized drawings that he would offer in exhibitions in non-profit locations such as the South Side Community Art Center or the Afam Art Gallery in Chicago. Onli was never accepted or handled by commercially established art galleries or art dealers.
This drawing and this entire collection was "lost" in Paris during an unfortunate stressful exchange there while Onli was doing his Rhythmistic Future-Primitif thing there in the late 1970s. That was a crushing blow to Onli at that time when he was taking on the international Fine Art and Illustration worlds with his powerfully intelligent Rhythmistic ideas and practices.
The negative resistance was unrelenting.
It was rough in those circles for a gifted openly heterosexual Black male visual innovator.
Yet Onli succeeded.
"Rhythmism Lives!"
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