Michael O'Donnell
Look Who's Talking
Michael O'Donnell, Look Who's Talking, 2022. Photo: Julie Hrnčířová
Oslo Kunstforening is pleased to open the autumn season with the solo exhibition Look Who's Talking by Michael O'Donnell.
English-born O'Donnell (b.1950) has been a prominent figure on the Norwegian art scene since the end of the 1970s, both as an artist and as a long-standing professor of sculpture at the Academy of Fine Art in Oslo.
With education from the Royal College of Art in London and influence from international currents, especially new British sculpture, O'Donnell added something new to the Norwegian art scene.
From his first solo exhibition at UKS (Young Artists’ Society) in 1979 with the title That Precious Object Again, he has been keen to explore and challenge sculpture's position as a monument and carrier of meaning, often through a combination of non-traditional materials and a political commitment.
For the exhibition at Oslo Kunstforening, he shows three larger installations with new sculpture and video works. In Look Who's Talking we are presented with dark chapters in world history where, among other, the nuclear threat, the death penalty and the Second World War form the backdrop for three different narratives. A ventriloquist doll is a repetitive element and takes on different roles, both as a person of authority and audience, and as a representative of morality, religion and the state. The doll casts doubt on who is speaking, on whose behalf and for what purpose.
Michael O'Donnell, Look Who's Talking, 2022. Photo: Julie Hrnčířová
Bio
Michael O'Donnell was born 1950 in Manchester, UK. He has been based in Norway since 1977 and lives and works in Sande in Vestfold. O'Donnell is a graduate from the Royal College of Art (1974) and Leeds College of Art (1972). Alongside his own artistic practice, O'Donnell has held teaching positions at Croydon College in London (1974-1977) and at the Academy of Fine Art in Oslo (1982-2019). He has extensive international experience with teaching and project development, such as the Academy Without Walls in Zambia, the Center for Contemporary Art in Afghanistan and the International Academy of Art in Palestine.
His work has been presented in art institutions at home and abroad, including Henie Onstad Kunstsenter, Bærum; Galleri F15, Moss; Bomuldsfabrikken, Arendal; No Place, Oslo; Mongolian National Art Gallery, Ulaanbaatar; National Gallery Durban, and most recently Bærum Kunsthall, Norway (2018).
Public commissions in Norway includes Førde Town Hall; Posten Norge AS Oslo; The City of Oslo Art Collection; Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Ås; and Oscarsborg fortress, Drøbak. O'Donnell is represented in collections such as the Gothenburg Museum of Art, Sweden; the Black Mountain College Collection, US; the Nordic Center of Art, Finland, Rogaland Art Museum Norway and the National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design, Norway. This is Michael O’Donnell’s second exhibition at Oslo Kunstforening, the first was in 1985 titled Looking for Englishmen.
Michael O'Donnell, Look Who's Talking, 2022. Photo: Julie Hrnčířová
The exhibition has been initiated by Marianne Hultman, former director of Oslo Kunstforening. A conversation between O'Donnell and Hultman will take place on Wednesday September 21st at 18.
Michael O’Donnell will do a presentation of the show during Kulturnatt, September 16th at 18.
Opening Thursday September 1st at 18. The exhibition will be opened by artists Lotte Konow Lund and Victor Mutelekesha.