Sneeuwuil (original Dutch title)
Color woodcut reduction on thick white wove paper.
Edition of 17.
Signed and numbered in pencil.
Image size: 12 x 14 1/4 inches.
Erik van Ommen (Dutch, born 1956) has a singular passion,
rendering wildlife in a wide array of fine art techniques which he each masters
with excellence. He received his formal artistic training at the Academie voor Beeldende Kunsten Minerva in the northern Dutch city of Groningen, where his
famous compatriots Grietje Postma and Siemen Dijkstra also studied. Van Ommen
soon discovered his ability to capture and render birds’ attitudes quickly in
the wild using the Japanese-inspired ink painting technique named Sumi-E, which
relies on grayscale for all shading. These sketches can be finished en plein air or in the studio, but often also form the basis for oil
paintings, etchings, and more recently for color woodcut reductions. While van
Ommen paints a greater variety of wildlife subjects in oil, in his Sumi-e
paintings and in his prints, he almost exclusively depicts the birds which he
so loves to see close-up in nature through his telescope lens. For this initial
collaboration with Erik van Ommen we feature his color woodcut reductions
exclusively. These are all printed in small editions. If you happened to be as
enamored with them as we are, we recommend you do not pause too long before you
decide to bring home the one that speaks to you. These works of art won’t last.
