Themes

Themes is the most comprehensive collection of Odd Nerdrum’s works ever published. Its lavish 500 pages are filled with sketches, drawings and studies, along with excellent reproductions of the artist’s most important and most recent finished works. A wide selection of close-up details offers the tightest possible view of Nerdrum’s brush strokes, which will be of particular interest to students – those who wish to learn his modern take on the old master style just as they would learn from the work of the old masters themselves. The selection is divided into 21 chapters devoted to space, nudes, portraits, and other topics, and presented chronologically within each chapter to show the development of specific motifs over the course of his career. This structure and the wide range of work present provoke new insights into the central themes in Nerdrum’s work, and his treatment of them from first sketches to final canvasses. Nerdrum’s latest works – dating from the last five years – are presented here for the first time. They complete an unprecedented overview of his oeuvre, a must for everyone interested in the how and why behind one of today’s most controversial and celebrated painters. The book opens with a literary review by Bjørn Li, who has followed Nerdrum’s work and the debate accompanying it for many years.