November 6, 1984

REVIEWS: CY TWOMBLY When I look at a painting or drawing by Twombly I think of Rome and the messy way the mind works. Not enough but then again too much of it. The two panels appeal to me (one large than the other). DAVID HOCKNEY Probably the awfullest paintings he's ever done and I liked a few of the larger ones. It is as though being David Hockney takes up so much of his time he doesn't have the time to paint. And that may be for the better because Hockney has never had a very wide-open sense of aesthetics and his early fame is based more on his subjects (and technique in prints) than the way he did them. He is not so much experimenting with anything now as he is tackling what little he knows with the ability he's got. I wish he would stop looking at Picasso when he paints. ROUL DUFY It's hard to pinpoint exactly why these paintings are bad...only that their badness doesn't lead anywhere (which can be said for paintings that are good, too). I find myself going to galleries more and more for the entertainment (or perhaps that's why I always went and am now finally admitting it) and so see nothing wrong with using criticisms that I would use for other entertainment. I realize that those shows I remember most depended more on show than they did substance, that I really do not look very closely at the work but take in the whole, the general. And it may be that the particulars do not hold my interest enough for me to give them closer examinations (I like Chartres Cathedral more than the Rose Windows of Chartres.) What was interesting about the Dufy show were the paintings hung in the back. The varieties of decorative art. Someone has obviously discovered a chache of old Dufy's and would like to sell them at a high rate. JEDD GARET His shows always seem to be half and half and 70/30.I wonder what they would be like if he just had a few paintings up. But, then again, some of the paintings act as background for others, support. Some new imagery but the result is not as interesting as a copy of OMNI magazine or HEAVY METAL. There was a small book on the making of the Olympic sculptures by Robert Graham -- the models were photographed from the neck down. That the end product didn't look anything like the bodies they were taken from is of no probable importance but I wonder why he used models in the first place? JULIAN SCHNABEL Pace has been gutted and given Schnabelesque proportion now that they have him on their team. A woman standing at the desk seemed upset that a painting she wanted was not available -- as though she had lost a particularly viral lover. As for me there is an indisputable power in all of his work, but then it is the power of a rogue bull let out in the flower garden. If I was taken to comparison I would compare his paintings to those of Chagall -- big, beautiful, powerful and of absolutely no interest to me whatsoever. Go figure. WILL INSLEY A warning to myself not to make things too sterile just as Schnabel is a warning not to make insignificant painting too demanding. Too little or too much I should always stick to the middle ground. But I'm glad that others do not.