Susan Rothenberg at Sperone Westwater - New York, New York - Review of Exhibitions

Art in America, Jan, 1995 by Robert G. Edelman

Human and animal fragments float like disembodied spirits in the painterly fields of Susan Rothenberg's recent canvases. These 13 paintings from 1993-94 are stronger overall and more coherent than the work in her last show at Sperone, largely because they are more concise and focused and therefore more accessible. As a former New Image painter, Rothenberg seems to be at her best when her portentous elements are reduced to their simplest terms. Here her subject matter, her inventive use of pictorial space, and her singular painting method have become better integrated.

A good number of these works offer haunting and evocative images that seem to emerge from a deep source, perhaps partly inspired by the artist's relocation to galisteo, N.M. several years ago. In Calling the Dogs, Rothenberg arranges sketchy forms in an ascending order. A pair of burntred arms extends vertically (their clapping hands causing a stir of crimson in the surrounding air) toward four floating, long-snouted dog heads. A face outlined at the bottom edge of the bright yellow ground appears to be beckoning from a distant netherworld. Rothenberg maintains an air of spontaneity while conjuring up mysterious hieroglyphs that together describe some timeless ritual.

Two of the largest paintings, Accident #2 and Accident #3, are among the more elusive in terms of content. In the former, a massive horse about to topple over can be seen at the top of the canvas, its neck bent down to its hooves. Scattered nearby are three human limbs, like markers on a race course. Although the composition is boldly asymmetrical, the placement of these elements and their relationship to one another seems relatively arbitrary. Accident #3 is a more intriguing work in which an elongated human leg seems to be kicking a head away from its own torso. Dismembered body parts, rendered in brick red against an activated white ground, ricochet down the painting as if inside a pinball machine. Rothenberg's fragmentatation of the figure, recalling stylistic devices of Baselitz and Guston, does not quite work in this painting.

Rothenberg's rich iconography continues to grow and mutate, the horse being only one of many subjects now. Small wonder that she admires de Kooning, a fellow voyager into the psychic unknown. Like him she seems willing to chance failure in her work, showing a courage all too rare in painting today.