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[[image]] 7 Cornell: box with "broken windows," 1953. [[image]] 8 Cornell: Hôtel Andromeda, ca. 1953. [[image]] 9 Cornell: Hôtel du Nord, ca. 1953. Whitney Museum omeda, Cameleopardalis, Auriga, Andromeda, Cameleopardalis, Auriga, Andromeda, Cameleopardalis, Auriga, Andromeda, Camele saw that the paper shape had been affixed to the wood, the arm gesturing toward a deeper and less penetrable space, like window opening on a window. And in Hôtel de l'Étoile, [fig. 6], I saw how a small glass rectangle had been set in a larger panel of worn white wood. Within the inlay two plates, sprayed with different, very fine star-patterns, had been superimposed. Nothing could be simpler. Yet here before me was a complex section of the evening sky. Even simpler and more strict were several untitled constructions which used, in the inlay-section, the effect of fractured glass [fig. 7]. These bullet-holes into eternity had a neat and desperate quality. When one examines a Joseph Cornell objectively, one has before one perhaps a French hotel-ad, a wooden cylinder, a broken piece of "unbreakable" glass but, if one goes farther, one realizes that the essence of this careful art - which is not painting, sculpture or architecture - is paradox. It can best be described by such tropes as "close distance," "sophisticated naiveté," "shallow profundity." The box itself is shallow; its contents, trivial though perhaps as potent and far-reaching as Pandora's. The contents, coldly considered, may be a bit of wire, a cube or two, a silver ring suspended on a silver bar, for this artist is fascinated by snow, ice, crystal, tinsel, but from these unextraordinary objects a hypnotic mood is often created. The emotion, so accurately caught, is that of pure awe at the existence of the night-world. When one gazes at the construction, Hôtel Andromeda [fig. 8], for instance, one seems to be transported to a great height. Disembodied, one appears to walk along an empty corridor, till one comes upon a tall window, facing an immense prospect, looking toward the stars. The construction is eloquent of detachment, of cold attention, of surveillance from a height over an extent of history or a geographical vista. The mood is that of a Merlin, a Klingsor in his tower, or a mad movie-scientist at three in the morning, confronting the spectacle of the universe. But how long can this last? With a jolt one finds oneself in the known world standing before only a wooden cross-piece, a sliver of glass, an effect of light and shadow. A feeling of frustration may come from such experiences. If one could take the box apart, [Continued on page 63] The variety within consistency of Cornell's work is seen in these illustrations, and also in his one-man show this month at the Stable Gallery. They include memorials to great personages of the theater, such as Taglioni 10, an archetypal ballerina; the sound of a cricket (Grillon) emanates from an 18th-century clock wrapped in a cocoon of threads 3. His most recent preoccupation is icy white hues and windows opening on star-spattered skies. [[image]] 10 Joseph Cornell: Taglioni's Jewel Casket, 12 inches wide, 1940. Museum of Modern Art
