(35 ⁵³/₆₄ H x 24 ¹/₆₄ W inches)
"Waves emerge from the sea, riding on the surface of the collective waters, each believing it is separate from surrounding waves, each with its own shape and form and its own particular perspective in which it is orientated to the world. Eventually it tires and returns back to the Truth of the sameness that it never wasn't.
We, too, emerge into life and seeing the difference of form of the "other", assume we are separate. The ego's job, to define the edge of self, of Me, to keep the individual safe and fed, devours any and all information about our separateness, our specialness. We rise out of the crowd, out of the background or the field of colour, an individual, believing in the story of Self.
I am unique.
Nairobi, a massive city, a storm surge of humanity, constant and unrelenting and yet... each person, so beautiful, with a meaningful life. If the time is taken, the moment is held, there is this beautiful opportunity, when oriented from Love, to see each person as holy, their journey sacred, their life rising out of the common-ness. Each life, a sweet story of relating, of falling lost, of coming home. A worthy epic of a hero's tale, but lost in the roaring of the sea.
Each person, both unique and completely the same."
Olivia Mae Pendergast
Olivia Mae Pendergast captures the true essence and spirit
"Olivia’s paintings are reminiscent of a golden age where artists were daring, bold and inventive, in search of new perspectives, greater freedom, and a simplicity that is the purity and essence of life. It would be remiss not to acknowledge the clear parallels between Olivia’s style of work and the old master, Modigliani, a fact she acknowledges, as she discovered and fell in love with the artist’s work as a student years ago.
The iconic disproportion and elongated forms of her Kenyan muses, the vacancy of their expressionless eyes, and their easy, but stoic poses, pay homage to, and reference his masterpieces. However, what makes Olivia’s portraits uniquely distinct and significant in style and in substance, is the subject of her muses and her balancing of the scale.
Empathy and a quest to truly see and appreciate people as they are, is integral to Olivia’s practice and motivations. Her loose, almost transparent brush strokes, and soft, muted colour palette, serves as an intentional visual device to see beyond, and through the obvious physical traits of her sitters in an attempt to capture their true essence and spirit, and connect on a deeper and more ethereal level."
Raphael Dapaah,
Art Consultant OOA Gallery London
CATALOGUE
