Nathan OliveiraWings of Consciousness

“Stanford and the Windhover Paintings,” clip from Nathan Oliveira Oral History (2009), Stanford Historical Society Oral History Program Interviews (SC0932). Department of Special Collections & University Archives, Stanford University Libraries & Academic Information Resources, Stanford, CA.

Nathan Oliveira envied the freedom of birds in flight, soaring high above and seemingly detached from earth. In the mid-1980s, the artist began exploring the shape of a bird wing as a metaphor for the mind: “The catenary curve can become the circular curve of the earth. I want to show how the mind can transport itself beyond the barriers of the ground.”1 On large canvases—the scale reflecting the grandness of their spiritual nature—Oliveira painted wings with zoological precision and vigorous brushwork, refining and abstracting the concept of flight.

  1. Hilarie Faberman, Nathan Oliveira: “The Windhover”: Recent Wing Paintings and Related Works (Stanford, CA: Stanford University, 1995), 3. ↩︎