Descrizione

Einband leicht berieben. - Text schwed. u. engl. - Having once focused her eyes in the haze of marks and erasures that characterize a work's beginnings, Rothenberg has found herself witness to scenes of awkward tenderness - for example the spectral Grandmother (1983-84) with its two embracing forms dissolving into one another - or an equally awkward and unsettling confrontation, as in phantom Beggar (1982). Prophetic of the legions of homeless that now inhabit every neglected corner of New York City, the picture is less a social document than an evocation of the fragility of life lived "hand to mouth", and a reminder of the vague but inescapable knowledge "solid citizens" have of that phantom existence. A sense of mortality - but not morbidity - also infuses Mist from the Chest (1983). As it happened the yellowish tint that fans out from the rigid, floating body was a stain that occurred when the canvas was soaked by run-off rain. Combining equanimity and practicality, the artist incorporated that accident into the picture's composition such that it looks as if the discolored water that drenched his form in fact emanates from it like the breath of a drowning man. Responsive in this way to the unexpected, Rothenberg can be equally quick to alter or plow under, an idea or image whose long preparation would, for most artists, guarantee its permanence. More than once, "finished" pictures have arrived at her gallery with Rothenberg close behind, fully prepared with paints and brushes to "correct" oversights, eliminate "extras" or give new emphasis to their overall composition. ISBN 9188090019