Transition

Tatianna O’Donnell 

November 8, 2022 to February 4, 2023

Tatianna O’Donnell captures the fleeting moments that we store in our memory; the fields and forests that whiz by when we are going somewhere else. O’Donnell draws our attention to the places in-between where we have been and where we are going. Hazy scenes pass us by in a blur of colour and motion. 

O’Donnell’s series Transition started 8 years ago when she began to take a new kind of photograph on her travels. Rather than focusing on the destination, she wanted to capture the time spent on route. These in-between moments feel universal – an experience shared by anyone who has journeyed by car, bus or train and watched the world slip by. Using her photos as a reference, O’Donnell’s resulting oil paintings embody that experience, embracing both the movement of the journey, but also the sense of stillness and a feeling of waiting patiently to arrive.

Focusing on colour, texture and atmosphere, O’Donnell embraces the physical nature of oil paint to help bring her vision to life. As a paint, oil has a lusciousness and malleability that she harnesses to reproduce that sensation of moving through a landscape at speed.

In a few of the works, O’Donnell includes reflections glinting on the inside of a window, which obscure the landscapes beyond. They invite the viewer into the piece, welcoming them to sit back and become absorbed in their own memories. In Transition, the destination becomes irrelevant. There is beauty to be found whirring past, just outside the window.

Image Credit: Tatianna O’Donnell, Remembering Stillness, 30x40”, 2020.