"Question? If an Artiste names a genre and the art world refuses to embrace it, did it really happen?  Does omission rule reality?  Can one undo what was done, yet not sanctioned?  

Recently Prof. Onli wrote to a major, well-connected dealer of Fine Art created by Black Americans & the Africobra group. In it he stated how he was a youthful peer to Africobra in the 1970s when he founded and directed B.A.G., The Black Arts Guild. Onli was suggesting this dealer represent one or more of his Rhythmistic bodies of Fine Art.

NOTE: Click on each image to enlarge your viewing experience.

Poster from a B.A.G. exhibition at the AFAM Art Gallery in Chicago, 

B,A,G. Members in Washington DC. in 1972. Prof. Onli is on the far right.

  

"Family Group" Oils on canvas circa 1970. Turtel Onli

A dynamic straight line ran through his decades long practices from being included in the prestigious Johnson Publishing Company Fine Art Collection in 1971 to the art being sold at auction via the elite Swann Galleries recently. 

Rhythmism, in the mid 1970s, predated the current trending of Afrofuturism.  

Hype from a recent solo exhibition program by Prof. Onli at the University of Chicago.

Then on the commercial side, Onli launched the growing impactful Black Age of Comics in 1992.  Hmm? How Black was the Graphic Novels, Games or Animation industries before that?  One of his early Rhythmistic Black Age characters was recently featured on the outer wall of the Musuem of Contemporary Art, Chicago.

 Onli also offered various acclaimed collections of Rhythmistic Fine Art for representation.  Of course, this is not the first overture to this dealer or others. 

In this era where fake Basquiats can rage in highly vetted art circles and the trending of mediocre romantic social statements reign large as great artistic expressions or museum attractions one can see why this dealer and so many others are slow to participate inRhythmism, a Future-Primitf Approach to Visual Art. 

 Being that Onli boldly launched two movements in the Visual Arts without the permission or sanctions from the status quo.....they are short-circuited by their state of conclusive orthodoxy. It does not compute.  To them and the Visual Arts Power brokers......a visual Artist must never coin the artistic term to define a genre or a movement.  

This artistic branding is done exclusively by well-connected Art Historians, Art Critics and or course those who control Fine Art markets.

NOTE: Dali did not coin Surrealism. Warhol did not coin Pop Art. Van Gogh did not coin Impressionism.  The value is in his dedicated prolific practice. Onli saw the open path....coined the term......and shared its potential. 

Now it may be up to the more enlightened well-resourced independent stakeholders who say they are about real diversity, openness and growth to celebrate, and invest in Rhythmism, The Future-Primitif Approach To Visual Art.  Of course, that includes its bold founder, Prof. Turtel Onli. M.A.A.T.

A review per art critic Harold Haydon,

 former Director of the Midway Studios of the 

University of Chicago.

Onli was dating his Rhythmistic Fine Art 1999 in the late 1970s to serve notice that he understood the politics and trends of the Fine & Commercial Art worlds were simply not ready or willing to accept his Rhythmistic Future-Primitif approaches to the Visual Arts. Once 1999 happened he reverted to traditional dating and signing of his works. 

"Benchmark" is a collection of functional art as utilitarian benches in the important Chicago Children's Musuem at Chicago's popular Navy Pier.  Onli is shown in this photo in his studio working on his bench that that important collection. That was in 1995. The bench is still there. In fact, it has gained attention from serious collectors annually who visit while attending the international Art event, EXPO CHICAGO, also at Navy Pier.

So far there is no response from that dealer.  Such has been that case with established fine art dealers since the 1970s.

 Prof. Onl's take on all of this is, "RHYTHMISM LIVES!!!"