(Note: Each image will enlarge to enhance your viewing experience.)

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 doesn’t bespeak the “traditional” African 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 don’t 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 the early 1970s, and rightly so.

The paintings, wearable art and performances he creates are alive with RHYTHM.

His work is demonstrative in its force.

Prof. Turtel Onli with his showstopping "Rhythmistic Adinkra Bambara Madonna Quilt" in the "Parapluie" group exhibition at the Hyde Park Art center, Chicago. 2024.

 

Visual excursions: “Tanya” Oils on 24” X 36” canvas 1985. 

Akomo Colored pencil on 18” X 24” acid free paper 2015.

 

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 doesn’t deny itself but digs down into itself to bare yet a new fruit for the future.  This future fruit, a Rhythmistic one, is a universal fruit to embellish the entire fabric of humanity.

!975 For Mile Davis.

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 mainstream White Art Community. Onli is representative of a new age, a forward-thinking age. An age that has a vision of an Africanization of the future by an Africa that is viable in the global scheme of things.  And a world unified by its universal values.

 

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 Future-Primitif visual art movement gives the art critics, patron, and maker the opportunity to expand their concept of the universal.

"Reach" Oils on 30" X 40" museum profiled archival canvas. Circa 1998.

Written by Marcia Hicks, PhD. Circa 1986

 

 Prof. Turtel Onli, with his extensive practice can guide you through the essential intricacies related to your artistic and creative assets, addressing key considerations such as selection, growth potential, tax implications, and valuation challenges, to build, or the seamless transfer of your precious collection to family members, individuals or selected institutions. Plus provide you with access to directly acquire treasured artworks and masterworks from his considerable series of original impressive Rhythmistic Fine Art. Without paying the typical gallery / agent 100% mark up.

 Perfect for your heirs and legacy!

Whether you're just beginning to establish your valued art collection or seeking to refine your existing estate plan, these insights offer beneficial strategies to ensure your artistic treasures are enhanced or safeguarded for future generations.

Prof. Onli has created two proven artistic genres. He is a two-time graduate of the elite School of the Art Institute of Chicago. His practice includes works sold in the SWANN Galleries auction, certified and appraised, and critically reviewed and exhibited over five decades, A quick Wiki search will provide additional insights to the founder of Rhythmism: The Future-Primitif approach to Visual Art and more. Copies of the official appraisal document are available to well resourced collectors. Prof. Onli has also been a professor of Art Appreciation in Chicago since 2007.

Prof. Turtel Onli's museum worthy Rhythmistic practice is grounded in his dymaxion imagination that goes beyond the limiting narratives of social events, statements of protests or celebrating selected historical movements to manifest both an opulent place and a distinct artistic voice in Fine Art, Illustration plus the worlds of Graphic Novels and Comic Books.

Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago and the 

Corvus Gallery at the University of Chicago

 Here are some insights into the value. legacy and impact of 

Rhythmism as imagination driven Future-Primitif visual art.

Box Factory For the Arts, Saint Joseph, Michigan,

 Art of Imagination, our Definition:

This art may be called by many names – Fantastic Realism, Surrealism, Magic Realism, Visionary Art, Cosmic Art and Inspirational Art, however the work is neither purely abstract nor rigidly realistic. Members of the Society work independently of one another in various countries yet their work shows a consistent ethos.

Since our inception we have grown to be an international society with members all over the world. Our American offshoot is a registered US charity.

Excerpts from “Rediscovering the Plot” by Michel de Saint Ouen published in Inscape Summer 2001

“The artist should be a creator, a transformer linked to the inner spirit who, with skill  and imagination, constructs a creation which  embodies or symbolises a significant  human value in a way which never existed before; to enhance, illuminate and perpetuate  what is best in human values.” “What is termed ‘art of imagination’ portrays the dramas which are the human  conditions, exploring and expressing mysteries so as to make them comprehensible.” “…and the chief contribution that artists of the imagination can make is  their power to enlarge the range of emotions which affect all of us, enriching  psychic, metaphysical, and spiritual values, and the appreciation of  the beauties of the physical world which expand delight in existence and enhance  self-realisation.” "Place Setting" is oils on archival 24" X 36" canvas board. It is both a Kwanzaa icon and part of the growing "Passion Fruit" collection.

"Danse du Melons" Circa 2024: Oils & Acrylics on three 48" X 24" repurposed industrial panels. 

Part of the growing "Passion Fruit" collection. Onli started hi "Passion Fruit" watermelon themed body of Rhythmistic: Future-Primitif visual art to shift the negative demeaning stereotyping of Black Americans in association to the watermelon and its origin in Africa.  In this bold effort he established the watermelon as the logo of B.A.G.: The Black Art Guild. That started in 1970, now he has morphed the iconic body of artworks into much more.

Curator Dan Nadel during his visit to Onli's unique "Rhythmistic Residency".

Curator Nadel later stated,  "As you know, I love Turtel’s work and appreciate his place in the history."

Museums and major galleries and centers of art will appreciate that Prof. Onli has a proven growing solo exhibition of watermelon inspired Rhythmistic works of art called "Passion Fruit". It explores the travels of the health-giving watermelon in various Future-Primitif contexts. From its dreadful distortion as a negative stereotype to becoming a powerful agent of cultural pride and healthy choices.  Enigmatic yet wonderfully attractive.

Miami Art Week Link:

Excerpts from Onli's critically acclaimed "Passion Fruit" Collection 

at the African American Art Expo, Chicago.

The exclusive exhibition record of Prof. Onli's Rhythmistic practice includes selected universities and elite art centers.

Onli with a smart art collector of his Rhythmistic Fine Art at the African American Art Expo.

Curator Dan Nadel visited Onli during his "Rhythmistic Residency" at the Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago, 2020. Nadel is currently the Curator At Large for the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art. 

He is in front of two of four impressive Rhythmistic Kokopellis created by Onli on archival natural unstretched fabric. Each represents an art form. Visual Art, Performing Art, Musical Arts & Literature. 

Curator Zakkiyyah Najeebah Dumas-O'Neal 's reaction during her visit to the "Rhythmistic Residency"!

An art enthusiast's meditative appreciation of Onli's Rhythmistic Artwork in the Musuem of Contemporary Art, Chicago's blockbuster group exhibition called "CHICAGO COMICS 1960 Until Now", curated by Dan Nadel. She is also along-time private collector of Onli's Rhythmistic artworks.

2021 Link

Prof. Onli teaches Air Brush Techniques per the School of the Art Institute's 

Ox-Bow Residency during the Summer Sessions of 2023 / 2024.

A focused student in Prof Onli's Ox Bow Air Brush Class.

 Diversity in an important permanent art collection should be as much about including various styles and acknowledging new genres as it is about esthetics, values, statements or cultures.

 "I have always offered Rhythmism as a Future-Primitif approach to the visual arts. First grown out of my youthful flow though both the Hippie infused Counter Cultural Revolution and the Black Cultural Movement of the late 1960s and early 1970s.  

Then enhanced and confirmed via my education and practices both being full of inspiring challenges and opportunities.  

 However, my overarching objective was to be beyond the usual trending protest art or homages to suffering and oppression. 

But more about Visual IQs.  Thinking differently. Expressing ideas and visions that were not simply a reaction to events and social factors. 

 

I continually produce Rhythmistic art that expands the canon of contemporary art.  Dali did not launch Surrealism.  Warhol did not coin the term Pop Art.  Picasso did not create Cubism as an art term.  I coined the term Rhythmism" in the early 1970s. This is visual arts innovation in real terms.  History has shown this. A Wiki search of my full name underscores its importance. (Turtel Onli).

Fortunately, I now have an official appraisal of my Rhythmistic practice. I am will to share this document with serious well-resourced collectors of contemporary art who truly want diversity without conflict form the source artist. I know my works belong in these collections. My history shows this. Rhythmistic art from its creator belongs in your collections! 

You may contact me via my email at onli@sbcglobal.net. I am unrepresented in these transactions which is of great benefit to you and your collecting goals. 

My appraisal document and prices-lists are available upon request."

 

This amazing book dropped Oct. 3rd 2023.  Ytasha Womack intelligently put together exciting crucial creative, cultural and commercial aspects of MARVEL's Black Panther.

This book is great for fans, educators, students, researchers and haters all should be up on this book.

 Prof. Turtel Onli is quoted four times in the book and references are made to "Rhythmism" and "The Black Age of Comics. Both were coined, founded and established by him. Rhythmism since the 1970s as a Future-Primitif approach to the visual arts.  The Black Age of Comics as a genre & movement that is derived from the Black, African, Urban and Alternative experience, since 1993.

Prof. Onli & Ytasha sharing a lil' luv & faith at Pocket Con in Chicago. NOTE: Pocket Con was modeled after the decades long Black Age of Comics Convention produced in Chicago by ONLI STUDIOS since Feb. 1993.

 

 Prof. Turtel Onli, M.A.A.T. &, PhD in Art Education and Rhythmistic Visual artist on Oct. 5th, 2023 at the opening ot the public of the group faculty exhibition at the downtown Harold Washington College. The Art & Architecture Department's amazing staff submitted works that were curated around the show's theme of "Critical Infrastructure".  It is open to the general art loving public and the entire college's community. LINK