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New York Post May 20,1962 

In the Art Galleries 
Irving Sandler
Marisol's "objects" at the Stable Gallery, 33 E. 74th St. make up one of the most remarkable shows to be seen this season. 

A melange of wood carving and construction, plaster modeling and casting, painting and drawing, Marisol's pieces defy classification according to traditional mediums. The variety of techniques that she uses is equaled by the abundance of her inventiveness.

Marisol juxtaposes unrelated motifs, associating them in unexpected contexts to create novel and extravagant images. Rarely has the Surrealist method of "poetic dislocation," to use James Thrall Soby's phrase, been employed more daringly and effectively.

A multiple portrait of "Ruth" is assembled from 5 carved wood heads and 9 leg that stick out from either end of a painted barrel. The breasts attached to the barrel-torso in this work are plaster molds of sundry fruits and vegetables.

The almost-like-size figures of Washington and Bolivar in "The Generals" are mounted tandem fashion on a horse from whose bowels martial music emanates. "Self Portrait" has a different grotesque head for each day of the week, and the prissy matron in "Madison Avenue" with a man-like dog in two has a live flowering plant for a coiffure.

Marisol produces shocks of a similar order in the combination of disparate artistic elements. A single line that begins as the contour of a case plaster leg is extended as the penciled edge of a flat torso and is continued as the curve of a wood block on which the feature of frontal and profile faces have been delicately drawn in the manner of Steinberg's cartoons and 19th century engravings. The fluency of these startling transition is evidence of Marisol's artistry.

Marisol's pieces are hilarious and caustic parodies on politics ("The Kennedys"), on society ("Mayflower," which caricatures the Pilgrims and their descendants as well as a favorite artists' hangout), on herself ("Self Portrait") and, above all, on art. She generally spoofs that kind of current art which is itself satiric - Neo-Dada, Junk-School, New Realism - a practice which requires the utmost sophistication. but Marisol carries it off with aplomb. She takes off on Saul Steinberg, Jasper Johns, William King, H.C. Westermann, Larry Rivers, Marcel Duchamp, Rene Magritte and others, but whatever she borrows she makes so completely her own that her works appear surprisingly original.

Another extraordinary artists, Peter Agostini, is exhibiting cast plaster sculptures at the Radich Gallery, 818 Madison AV. He bases many of his pieces on familiar urban objects, at once common, universal, intimate and impersonal. Unlike the Junk-School artists who incorporate real things into their constructions and collages, Agostini either casts found objects in plaster, presenting them in a new, incongruous and unnatural context, or he creates abstract forms that resemble wastepaper fragments.

The castoff gloves, cloth, string, newspaper and other debris attached to the grimy section of a tenement wall in "Winter Wall" when cast in pristine white plaster, appear both real and unreal. They are the ironic ghosts of objects, akin in their enigma to Di Chirico's images.

In other words, Agostini imbues his commonplace themes with an erotic voluptuousness. The seamy-looking rags in "Hurry" evoke a sensual reclining nude and on opulent piece of drapery in a baroque masterpiece.

The ordinariness of Agostini's subjects accents his consummate skill. Attention is focused on the craft that he lavishes on his pieces, on the vitality of the surfaces and on the fluent interaction of lights and shadows.

[[image]]
"The Generals," 87 by 76 by 28 inches, by Marisol, a 32-year old artist born in Venezuela, in her show at the Stable Gallery, 33 E. 74th St.

ART STUDENTS LEAGUE OF N.Y. present sculptures by students of John Hovannes, Jose de Creeft and Nathaniel Kaz in the gallery May 21 thru 26 215 West Fifty-seventh St. Open to the Public

Howard Wise Gallery 50W 57
Grillo
Through May 26th

Libbie Mark
Paintings & Collage
May 15 - June 2
KNAPIK Gallery
1470 First Ave. (77) St.)

OUT-OF-DOORS
Thru June
KORNBLEE 1018 Madison

GORDON'S Fifth Avenue Gallery
Norman Kanter
Recent Paintings
68 Fifth Ave. (13)th St.) Closed Mon.

MERRILL GALLERIES, INC
Formerly Bernhardt Crystal Galleries Inc.
54 East 58 St.
PL 2-6983
Summer Hours, Mon-Fri 11 am-5:30 pm
Air-Conditioned
Now Exhibiting
SHART
First New York Showing

George Segal Paintings & Sculptures
Green Gallery, 15 W. 57. NYC