The art of Ojile is an enigma to many. His seemingly childlike scrawls, use of house paint and playful images traipsing across canvases belie the depth of thought and skill that it takes to create them.

His latest work, in a show called "Terra Incognita" at The Honolulu Academy of Arts (see box), is a collection of mixed-media works (acrylic, charcoal, crayon, ink and more) on canvas and paper. The collection contemplates the fragility of life, the continuum of time and the grandeur and grace of God.

Many of the paintings have layers of paint, and even previous incarnations as other paintings, underneath them. Ojile creates works that enable him, and those who are willing to take time to understand his art, to plumb the depths of human existence that are sensed, but seldom understood.

"Art is about finding a meaning in not a logical way," Ojile explained as he stood in the middle of his cluttered Makiki condo living room. "It's one of the ways to understand the world. Math and science are close to art because they're all about the shape the investigation is taking." Ojile relishes the exploration.

He loves to read ancient Latin, a carryover from his Roman Catholic education. One of his current paintings is titled "Fons at Origo," a Latinate phrase referring to the source and origin of all things. "It has to do with DNA," he said. Another painting, "Lunar Tablet," deals with the source of magic, while his "Equations" series is inspired by experimental math (an interest since eighth grade) and still another derives from Psalm 90, "You Sweep Us Away Like a Dream," addressing life's boundaries and how we go from one plane of existence to another. "It's the idea that life is a mystery; we're born into life and then we die. It's about God, this unknown power we have to surrender to. It's about fear of annihilation but finding meaning in life," he explained.

Alan Leitner of Kailua, an artist and professor of art at Leeward Community College, appreciates "the freshness, immediacy and spontaneity" of Ojile's paintings. "There are certain art styles that either you can do it or you can't. You can't learn to paint like Jean Michel Basquiat or Tim Ojile. It's a gift that they have, and anyone who knows anything about art can look at it and know that it's good work."

Leitner said he recognized in Ojile's style that "There's an aesthetic to mark-making. To learn a highly personalized vocabulary of mark-making like Timothy has, you need to find your own language. That's the hard part about it." Mark-making refers to the way an artist creates images, often including words, lines, numerals or shapes.

A psychic sent him

Ojile must have been quite a surprise to his accountant father and homemaker mother in Minneapolis. The only artist in the family, he majored in Eastern art history at University of Minnesota, then took off to explore the art world in New York City.

"In 1981, I consulted a famous witch/astrologer, Sybil Leek, who told me to come to Hawai'i," Ojile explained. "I've been painting and living on the edge ever since. I'm willing to do this because I'm bound and determined to paint. I'm so lucky to be able to do that."

Ojile's daily life is as much a dichotomy as his art. He relaxes by baking bread and pastries. He cooks curry dinners for a close cadre of friends. His vacations are often bird-watching expeditions in Kenya, Papua New Guinea and on Neighbor Islands.

He paints in his living room on a drop cloth, which he rolls up at night to sleep on a futon on the floor. His two bedrooms are stuffed with paintings, some rolled up, others framed. Details of his home accessories are also characteristic: stacks of Latin books share space with doll houses, toy clowns and action figures. "As a child I loved giants, but now I collect miniatures," he said, grinning. Another dichotomy.

While he allows himself plenty of time to prime the pump, gathering thoughts and ideas in sketchbooks for a painting or series, he responds to the spark that ignites when it's time to paint.

When he picks up a brush, he said, he needs to retreat from the world and block out everything. "I have to lose myself in it. It's a great place to be — it's an escape sometimes, but it's a place that's essential for an artist."

He gets up at 7 a.m., puts on a pair of shorts and plays music — either classical or weird, evocative stuff — and starts to paint. "I can easily do 60 paintings in a day. If I don't paint, it will dry up. You have to be responsible to that thing, that creativity, or you'll get off balance."

Whether you are an artist, a secretary or a fisherman, Ojile says, "What's important in your life is creativity — how involved you get in what you are doing."

While Ojile's art is now two-dimensional, he said "I'm probably a closet sculptor. My sketches have to do with sculpture, but to do it (sculpt) in real life, I just don't have the time for three dimensions."

Instead, he is hanging out at construction sites, shooting digital photographs of fuse boxes, wires, conduits and cranes. "This is very me, my boy side," he grinned. Ah yes, that little boy bubbles up to the surface again.

The teacher

Ojile supplements his painting by teaching classes at the Academy Art Center at Linekona, as well as offering private lessons to help painters find their own voice or unlock when blocked.

Art students get a clue that they are in for an unconventional experience when they receive the list of supplies for Ojile's class, Intuitive Painting. Included are four cans of latex house paint in primary colors and a brush at least three inches wide.

His teaching methods are, to say the lest, unorthodox. He asks students to close their eyes, put a brush or crayon in their nondominant hand and paint what they experience after he takes them on imaginary journeys such as flying through the skies over Thomas Square, then taking them by the hand into a deep, dark hole.

It's not an approach that works for everyone. One student dropped out after three weeks because she found the experience "too EST-y."

Chris Friese of Kahala said Ojile "sometimes practiced psychology without a license — he wants to incite a reaction." She has taken his class "at least four or five times over the past seven years" and plans to take it again. Why? "Because he allows you to experience the work right then and there, and he doesn't talk it to death and get real cerebral about it. There's discussion, yes, but most of the time it's a hands-on thing where he forces you to do it. His criticism can be sharp, but it has helped me stretch myself. He pushes the envelope." She added that his class places her in "an environment where you can learn and be free to be yourself."

About his teaching methods, Ojile said, "It may not be so easy to paint ideas, qualities and states of mind. ... Yet painting these, I am convinced, helps students paint even a simple still life with more vigor and a deeper sense of satisfaction."

In a recent written statement he also speaks as a teacher: "Our lives as artists are primarily concerned with self-discovery, exploration and renewal. These are awfully grand terms, I realize, and in a sense, everyone's life is concerned with these — or should be. For myself, creatively moving forward is a real gift regardless of the risk, and helping others to discover and explore is part of that gift."

Ojile is working on a book consisting of 20 teaching exercises based on the explorations conducted in his classes. The foreword to his book expresses his philosophy: "What makes art so important in our lives, I think, goes beyond what appears to be the beautiful and moves toward a personal, inward realm where many realities can be imagined, all varied and containing lives of their own."

Ojile is an artist who has ventured into that realm with courage and determination.