• Okun, a virtuoso draftsman, is represented by 5 large paintings in oils on plywood. Each depicts a single image of a man, woman or child, placed centrally or to one side of his composition. In his best pieces, the background to these figures is neutral and amorphous, with dry application of paint giving the effect of a weathered mural. As in the past, Okun adopts an anti-classical, grotesque approach to the human figure, opting for ugly, disturbing poses. Employing a yellowish flesh palette, he paints bodies sprawling on wrinkled sheets or crawling on all fours, their forms recalling the haunchers or carcasses of animals. Many of the people that Okun depicts appear to hover between life and death. His most terrifying panting is that of a baby with the body of a shrunken old man lying in a contorted position, a noxious fog seeping through the bars of his crib-cum-bier. Okun's irreverent attitude to the human figure reaches a climax with ins portrait of a man taking off his underpants. Is this image (and others) Okun's tongue-in-cheek response to classical depictions of women such as those of Ingres's bathhouse scene or Cezanne's Bathers ? A personal favorite among this range of superb paintings is the picture entitled "Man Cleaning His Teeth" in which a nude figure, toothbrush in hand is screaming in agony or ecstasy. A rewarding presentation.
  Angela Levine, "Jerusalem Post"
  

1982 | 1985 | 1986 | 1988 | 1989 | 1990 | 1991 | 1992 | 1993 | 1994 | 1998 | 1999 | 2006 | 2008