J. J. Murphy

Van Doren Waxter showed a series of portraits by Richard Diebenkorn two years ago. The uptown gallery’s current show, “Still Life,” presents still lifes that Diebenkorn made during the same period: 1956 to 1967. The New York critics at the time considered the artist’s shift from abstract expressionism to representation as a conservative retreat and betrayal of modernism. Diebenkorn’s position was akin to that of Fairfield Porter in contending that abstraction and representation represent a continuum, or, as he argued, “a realistic or non-objective approach makes no difference.” For him, only results mattered. The criticism of Diebenkorn was part of what Porter considered the prevailing “dogmatism” of established art critics, such as Clement Greenberg. It now seems a reflection of New York’s own provincialism in dismissing resistant developments here and in other parts of the country, notably San Francisco and Chicago. “Untitled (Still Life with Orange),” 1957, contains small abstractions, such as the slice of bread, within a larger abstract background. The strip at the top suggests a distant seascape, adding an unexpected element. “Knife + Tomato II” (1963) also appears to be a still life situated in a landscape by the ocean, with waves at the top. The abstract shape that mirrors the knife keeps the composition from being conventional. “Chair Outside” (c. 1959) divides the background into four quadrants of color; three of them contain purple and two shades of blue. The bluish shadows from the chair spill over into the orange segment, along with part of the blue quadrant itself. In a studio note during this period, Diebenkorn wrote, “When I select a subject to work from, I seem to include one element or thing that is all wrong—which works against the total feeling or unity.” This approach creates a certain formal tension; the “wrongness” allows these intriguing still lifes to transcend the genre. Please note: the show closes today, June 26.
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