"There is no document of civilization which is not at the same time a document of barbarism.

"There is no document of civilization which is not at the same time a document of barbarism." This chilling observation of Walter Benjamin's is nowhere more largely taken to heart than in the work of Leon Golub and Nancy Spero A two-part presentation overlooked work from the last four decades, first with selections from the '60 and '70 then from the '50 and '90 Welcome as it was, the first half of the exhibition was the les surprising. During the period it screened Golub's and Spero's oeuvres were complementary, each faithfully situated in a distinct sphere. What the other part of the show revealed was just by what mode similar their work once was, and to what extent in indirect ways, it is again becoming intertwined.

Given the amount of misunderstanding these sum of two units artists have provoked, simple observations may bear repeating. single is that Spero's work is not simply about "positive" or empathic images of women Her use of female figures exclusively is not an extremity but a means in her effort "to behold what it means to view the world end the depiction of women." Golub does not normally work as a "political artist" in the way artists as different as Ben Shahn or John Heartfield have done; he does not encourage us to take a side. Rather, he encourages an identification with the figures of power and brutality in his pictures, prompting us to question our acknowledge morality, not theirs.

In the works of the '50 through both artists, mysterious totemic figures come forth from darkness--perhaps more confrontationally in Golub's case than in Spero's, yet the similarities are more striking than the differences. The paintings are dirty yet compelling, as though the artists were fixed upon something they could as besides discern only "through a glass darkly." After the '60 and '70s--years of fervid struggle and experimentation--the present decade appears to be single of masterful clarification and amplification. although Spero's Sacred and Profane be in love with 1993--a 70-foot-long scroll, displayed along the top of the gallery wall like a portable frieze--mobilizes many of her more familiar images, they are not awayed alongside new ones. Whereas her early spiral ornaments were often agonizingly fixated in succession detail, this one is radiant: downright voluptuous in its imprinted constitutions effortless and open in the handling of rhymes and intervals. Golub's new paintings include as many female as male figures--the former a rarity in his work until now--and a also have graffitilike inscriptions that are beautifully integrated into the pictorial buildings The way the acrylic paint has been applied has also changed. Turning away from the arduous building up and scraping down of paint, Golub is now working frequently more directly and sparingly. The images in paintings like Lady have affection for and Agent Orange, both 1993 appear as allowing glimpsed abruptly, but unforgettably, by the and of bright flashes of stroboscopic light. These modern paintings possess a kind of demonic beauty that is recently made known to Golub's work. It's as admitting having originated in darkness, the work of the two Spero and Golub has grown toward the light without at all times repressing consciousness of the barbarity that underlies its civilized splendor.

COPYRIGHT 1993 Artforum International Magazine, Inc.

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