Overexpression, 1998,
oil on linen, 84" x 72"

ROSS BLECKNER
Mary Boone, Lehmann Maupin
    In a few short years, Ross Bleckner's paintings have moved from the metaphysical to the grossly physical. Gone ar the lyrical brush strokes, soaring birds, glowing urns, flowers, and candescent beams of light. The hand of the artist is no longer obvious; in its place is a sleek, mechanized pointillism, and the outcome ranges from grisly to bland to transcendent.
    Bleckner's surfaces are packed with small organic shapes the size of coffee beans that most resemble human cells. While in earlier work his symbolism frequently dealt with issues surrounding death and dying and has been associated with the AIDS epidemic, his subject matter seemed to hint at the afterlife. Now his concerns are literal, visceral: disease under a microscope. Some of the paintings at Boone were clusters of sickly grayish green cells festering with red, raspberry-like malignancies. Others resembled strands of DNA, chromosomes, floating molecules, and microorganisms.
    The method is one Bleckner devised for detail in his earlier work. Each "cell" is created by a short burst from an air gun that pushes wet paint away from the center to reveal a contrasting ground. The result is a delicate shading that suggest roundness and indeed, from certain vantage points, the effect is almost three-dimensional. Two oversize paintings at Lehmann Maupin, both titled Times and Communities, represented the best of the old and new Bleckner. The images are floating and amorphous, the colors muted grays and sepias. While they could be said to resemble amoebas, the paintings' content is more dreamy and ambiguous, and they glow with some of the inner light that vitalized Bleckner's work in the past.

-Carol Diehl