Odd Nerdrum

At 80 years old, Odd Nerdrum physical status not available right now. We will update Odd Nerdrum's height, weight, eye color, hair color, build, and measurements.

Odd Nerdrum (born 8 April 1944) is a Swedish-born, Norwegian figurative painter whose work is on display at museums around the world.

Anecdote and narrative are tied to Nerdrum's themes and style.

Rembrandt and Caravaggio's primary influences placed his art in direct conflict with the abstraction and experimental art that is considered acceptable in a large part of Norway.

Each year, Nerdrum produces six to eight paintings.

They include small, everyday items (such as bricks), portraits, and self-portraits, as well as large paintings that are apocalyptic in nature.

The figures in Nerdrum's paintings are often dressed as if from another time and place.

With his parents, Nerdrum returned to Norway at the end of the war.

By 1950, Nerdrum's parents had divorced, leaving the mother to care for Nerdrum and his younger brother.

In 1993, Nerdrum discovered that his father was not his biological father; his mother had a long association with architect David Sanfed.

From this union, Nerdrum was born. Nerdrum was educated in a Rudolf Steiner academy and then at Oslo's Art Academy.

Disillusioned with the art form taught at the academy, and with modern art in general, Nerdrum began to paint in a postmodern style with Rembrandt and Carravagio as influences.

He began a lengthy correspondence with German artist Joseph Beuys in 1965. According to Nerdrum, his art should be understood as kitsch rather than aspiration.

The distinction he makes between kitsch and art is drawn in Kitsch, a Nerdrum Manifesto.

The Kitsch Movement has inspired his students and followers, who often think of themselves as kitsch painters rather than artists.

Early life

Odd Nerdrum was born in Helsingborg, Sweden, in 1944. His parents, Resistance fighters, had been sent from Germany-ruled Norway to Sweden to direct guerrilla movements from outside the region. Odd and his parents immigrated to Norway a year after the war ended. Lillemor, his mother, returned to New York immediately after to study at the Fashion Institute of Technology. At this moment, the sensation of being unwanted and abandoned Nerdrum seemed to have remained with him until he was in his late thirties, and he often felt emotionally detached. In 1950, Nerdrum's parents divorced, leaving Lillemor's mother, Nerdrum, to raise two young children, Odd, and his younger brother.

Johan Nerdrum, the father of Nerdrum, was remarried later. Despite being sympathetic to Odd, he maintained an emotional distance between himself and his son. Odd was told not to attend the funeral at his death. Johan was not his biological father three years ago, and he discovered it three years later. Odd, was in fact the result of a misunderstanding between David Sandved and Lillemor. Before Lillemor's marriage, Sandved had been together, and this was revived during the war in a time when Johan was absent. Art critic Richard Vine describes this episode in Nerdrum's life as one that sparked "a conflicted preoccupation with origins and personal identity," which "came naturally to Nerdrum" and was represented in his photographs. He would continue to paint about these experiences.

In 1951, Nerdrum began formal education in Oslo's private Oslo Waldorf School (Rudolf Steiner Academy) rather than in the traditional public school system. Odd's education would distinguish him from his contemporaries. The device was based on anthropology, which saw mankind once living in harmony with the universe but now exists in a reduced state of rationality. Steiner believed humanity could regain a sense of higher truths and a sense of unity with the universe through spiritual or esoteric practices. For example, learning for students was often kinesthetic, with dramatic plays of history and fantasy as well as musical exercises based on ancient Greek vases' geometric designs, depicting figures moving in parallelograms. These parallel patterns can be found in later Nerdrum artwork as well as a keenness for iconographic representations and costume.

Jens Bjrneboe, a Norwegian author and mentor, said that Nerdrum demonstrated natural talent and industry at a young age, but also hunger for those with less capability than him.

Early education

Nerdrum began formal education in Oslo, Norway's private Oslo Waldorf School (Rudolf Steiner Academy), rather than in the national school system. Odd's education will set him apart from his contemporaries. The scheme was based on anthroposophy, which saw humanity once being in harmony with the universe but now exists in a less developed state of rationality. Steiner believed that humanity would return to a higher place and in a greater sense of balance with the Universe. For example, learning for students was often kinesthetic, as demonstrated by dramatic enactments of history and fantasy, as well as musical exercises reminiscent of ancient Greek vases' geometric designs depicting figures moving in parallel lines. These parallel patterns can be found in later Nerdrum artwork, as well as a concern for iconographic representations and costumes.

And at a young age, Jens Bjrneboe, a Norwegian author and mentor, said Nerdrum displayed tendencies of natural talent and industry, but also frustration with those with less capability than himself.

Early work (1964–1982)

The work of Nerdrum's first two decades of his artistic life consisted of large canvasses, often polemic in nature, that served to debunk conventional socioeconomic or economic viewpoints. The artwork from this period was highly realistic and detailed in character, with frequent attention to new ones, such as in clothing or in the design of a bicycle, as in the painting The Arrest. Although Vine states that Nerdrum's fame was not as expected, given the work's philosophy, the ideological Ashcan school movement, and the political Ashcan school movement, the subject matter was very similar. For the first time in 1968, Nerdrum had seen the works of Caravaggio's psychologically intense art, use of cross lighting, strongly suggested three dimensionality, and use of the faces of real, everyday people strongly influenced him, and was one of the key influences on his work at this time period. For many years, he would revisit Italy and Caravaggio's work for on-going inspiration.

As well, Nerdrum was a reader of visionary literature that included works by Rudolf Steiner, the prophetic William Blake, the dark Dostoyevsky, and the mystical Swedenborg. This will lead him to a more vertical outlook rather than the rigid Marxist one that inspired most artists with socially democratic sensibilities.

In the National Museum, Nerdrum had visited the master painters' exhibition as a young student. Rembrandt's The Conspiracy of Claudius Civilis (1661), in particular, served as a good antidote to his sensibilities. The young artist was disillusioned with modern art, as shown by Robert Rauschenberg's Monogram, a stuffed goat with a tire around its middle section standing on a gritty surface outside the Museum of Modern Art in Stockholm.

All of Nerdrum's work will be affected by these influences, both positive and negative. The conclusion of Nerdrum's more contemporary scene-like art and the push toward more Rembrandt-like painting elements all revolved around the enormous (11x1634 foot) refugees At Sea (1979-1980). According to Vine, Nerdrum later considered the job to be naive in the sense that Rousseau identifies the term, in which mankind is seen as innocent and innately healthy. The refugees, 27 Vietnamese boat people, are depicted in the painting, but in a politically sentimentalized way that Nerdrum later described as "cloying."

In 1981, Nerdrum produced a seminal work that would point to a change in direction from the sentimentalized image of refugees at Sea to a more realistic, realistic interpretation of reality. Twilight, a rear view of a young woman alone in a wooded landscape defecating, has nothing sentimental or ideal in its betrayal, but rather a stripped away view of life and reality.

Paintings were no longer multi-figured as they had been with Refugees at sea, and some of lifes were still based on specific objects, such as a brick or loaf of bread. The people who now populated Nerdrum's paintings were imbued with a sense of stillness, but more importantly, they were still alive, eliciting a cosmic oneness that transcended individuality, according to Vine.

These figures were costumed in clothing that would connect the viewer to a specific time and place rather than endowed with features or apparent stories that could distinguish them as unique: furs, skins, leather caps, rather than embellishing them with names or words that would identify them as unique: these figures were dressed as styles rather than endowed with attributes or apparent stories that could identify them as unique: furs, skins, leather caps.

These beings, who looked like archetypal humans, lived in pre-social, apocalyptic conditions, a reference to a place that was not familiar time or space.

Source