Page 47 - Studio International - April 1970

raft of an empty robe, drawn as if it were
occupied. There are sections and it is num-
bered, as if the artist were reducing himself to
an easy puzzle. The projection of the robe is
dramatic, self-assured and unselfconscious,
a persona of the physical and moral head of a
family. This lithograph seems to me to be a
culmination, of themes inspired primarily by
life with a family. Lithographs done after this
point work with metaphor that is more in-
terior, and less real as object. They retain the
sureness of conception and execution.
A metaphor of the painter is the palette, which
New York artists don't seem to use anymore.
Dine's palettes could be oblique comments,
on himself as an artist, that is when he is
actually working; as a poet might symbolize
himself as a quill, slightly tongue in cheek,
and go on to write thoroughly original poems.
On this idea, the palette, Dine goes on to
display his dazzling virtuosity. Colored Palette
is 'only' a palette, holding the rich variety of
colours waiting to be applied; Double Apple
Palette with Gingham reaches into the real:
apples, and the autobiographical: gingham
collage of the kind worn by his wife Nancy.
Flesh Palette in a Landscape is pure surreal
mystery, the stone from which the image of the
palette was printed becoming even more mys-
terious when printed in a separate edition in
white on black paper, a shadowy echo of
itself; as Night Palette.
Dine's preoccupations can be quite personal,
though publicly beautiful, but when there is
a specific subject at hand his sensibility can
lead to astonishingly natural conclusions. The
lithographic birth announcement of his third
son was the drawing (in blue) of a child's
penis. A commission by the Jewish Museum
resulted in The Creation, seven lithographs,
Night, Water, Clouds, Earth, Grass, Rain, and
Snow, depicted with admirable simplicity and
an absolute calm.
Boot Silhouettes is an incredible tour de force
even for Dine. The image, as I remember,
came after he had done a theatre piece, or 4
Brush After Eating 1963
happening, in which he sat in a chair and
Edition 28
remained silent, wearing large boots, while a Lithograph on German copperplate
76 x 102 cm.
tape recording of his voice was played. One
does not have to know that. The response to 5
Double Apple Palette with Gingham 1965
their apparent casualness can become ex- Edition 23
tremely complex, as the idea of the ocean, Lithograph and collage on East Indian
handmade paper
before one goes into it. 60 x 71 cm.
In 1965 Dine did the sets of Shakespeare's 6
Midsummer Wall 1966
Midsummer Night's Dream. He came to West
Edition 26
Islip enthusiastic about translating this theme Lithograph on Rives BFK
105 x 75 cm.
into lithography, which he did. But even with
a preconceived notion, Dine's quickness of 7
Tool Box II 1966
mind led him to include the immediate en- Edition 150 + 30 artists proofs
Screenprint and collage in
vironment, the wooden salad fork from the
red plexiglass box
kitchen, a shadow from a tree which fell on Each print on various commercial
papers, cartridges and acetates
the stone on which he was working.
61 x 48 cm.
As in Four C-Clamps it was the challenge of an
extremely unusual paper that resulted in
Kenneth Koch Poem Lithograph. The paper with
which he began was a delicate japan paper,
really two papers, light blue, with white hori-