Recent paintings take a significant turn

Chuck Close, Paul Simon, Elena Sisto, Rackstraw Downes

IN THROUGH THE OUT DOOR A young, buoyant crowd, enlivened by the day’s nonstop art crush, landed on West 53rd Street to let loose at The Armory after-party to benefit The Museum of Modern Art and P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center. A VIEW FROM A BRIDGE BACKED BY MOMA DONORS PERFECT CRANIUM THREE MUSES MUSTACHIOED CONNECTION … Continued

The impulse to take Close for granted is perhaps all the greater because the work has an effortless assurance to it. But we must slow down, look past the facility, past the celebrity, to find the real investigation still taking place.

Whatever it says in “The Wasteland,” from an art critic’s point of view, August is the cruelest month. Even the lingering group shows, the staple summer fare, peter out in the weeks before Labor Day. After Labor Day, la deluge, but when New York newspapers that usually don’t venture north of 90th Street start to … Continued