Louise Bourgeois

One contributor to this retrospective asks: “How is it that an artist whose career spans some seventy years continues to appear vital and contemporary...?” Bourgeois's work, sometimes abstract and sometimes not, is sculpture or installation, may be sewn out of fabric or carved out of wood, and is ever intimate, feminist, eccentric and interesting. The difficulty of memorializing the work of such an extraordinary living artist is handled through a “glossary” of terms, a neat trick that puts “Etching” next to “Existentialism” and “Materials” next to “Maternity.” This treatment pairs shorter and longer essays by art critics with excerpts from Bourgeois's diaries and interviews, providing a deep and textured sense of the artist's biography. Personally and creatively, Bourgeois was deeply affected by her mother's tolerance of her father's affair with the daughter's own tutor. Bourgeois's work doesn't follow any clear trajectory, so the episodic nature of this presentation displays her work appropriately. It can be difficult to connect a piece of text to the hundreds of reproductions of the artist's work (many in full spreads), but the overall impression is very effective—a suitable presentation for this intriguing and multifaceted artist. (Apr.)