Stephen Ormandy “Only Dancing”
Olsen Gruin
[Image: Stephen Ormandy "Storm King One" (2018) oil on linen 63 x 47.25 in.]
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Olsen Gruin presents Only Dancing, an exhibition of new abstract oil on linen paintings and resin sculptures by Australian artist Stephen Ormandy. Only Dancing marks Ormandy’s second solo exhibition with the gallery. Of his practice, Ormandy notes “my work is born of the subconscious mind.”
Ormandy’s works in explore his visual language by means of new motifs, triptych panels and wall-hanging sculptures. “I’m looking for vibration and rhythm, the play of line creating positive and negative space, searching for tonal balance through contrast or harmony, while developing chroma relationships that hug or repel.”
Though Ormandy’s paintings are contemporary and personal, his imagery evokes Hans Arp, and Calder. This is perhaps born of Ormandy’s interest in past artists’ methods. One immediately registers a sophisticated assimilation of Matisse’s use of paper collage into Ormandy’s own compositional approach, evoking otherworldy figures and landscapes.
His sculpture extends the formal and chromatic relationships of his paintings from into sensual yet architectural forms. The result of a practice that is both rigorous and playful, they move and enclose the viewer in an imaginative and dynamic space of Ormandy’s fancy.
The ‘only’ in Only Dancing implies both a freedom – ‘dancing and nothing else’ and a defense of the act of creation – ‘I’m only dancing.’ The works move sinuously through rhythms of shape, space, and color, art history, and abstract design.
Born in Melbourne, Stephen Ormandy graduated from The City Art Institute (now known as UNSW Art and Design) in Sydney in 1985. During his time at the college he met Louise Olsen and in their final year of study they established the design company Dinosaur Designs. Dinosaur Designs has grown to be one of Australia’s leading design brands specialising in resin and metallic jewellery and home wares.
Alongside his role as Creative Director of Dinosaur Designs, Stephen Ormandy has maintained and continued his independent artistic practice. Ormandy is inspired by the natural world and informed by a strong design aesthetic based on colour and form. There is a discernible dialogue between his large-scale oil paintings and sculptural work, with line, shape and surface each informing the other.
Ormandy was a finalist in the Sulman Prize at the Art Gallery of New South Wales in 2015. In 2016 Stephen Ormandy and Louise Olsen published The Art of Dinosaur Design that coincided with a travelling exhibition which has shows at Bega Regional Gallery and Hazelhurst Art Gallery.
His work is held in public collections across Australia including Artbank, The Sir William Dobell Art Foundation, The Powerhouse Museum, The National Gallery of Victoria and The Art Gallery of Western Australia.
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Schedule
from March 07, 2018 to April 10, 2018
Opening Reception on 2018-03-09 from 18:00 to 20:00