I’ve thought about updating on the windowbox colony in Philadelphia, which has undergone numerous personnel changes over the years, but I’ve got a new cam-phone and haven’t figured out how to send pictures. I’ll have another look, though. There was a very weather-beaten surfer-dood doll basically batching in the place the last time I looked, as the ladeez had all flown!

Of course, Bellmer was just doing what painters were doing with a different medium. When we look back at the angular and even violent reshapings of the human body in general (and the female form in particular) in paintings by Picasso, for example, and some of the German Expressionists, the connections to Bellmer’s work are pretty clear.

Robert Hughes ain’t a bad guy, and he has done a valuable service in making art criticism so accessible to Americans. But, from what I’ve read, he’s more focused on the aesthetics than the politics of art.