At the Phillips, John Cage's Wishy-Washy Watercolors

From: The Washington Post | Date: April 16, 1990| Author: Paul Richard | Copyright information

After nearly half a century of "purposelessly" playing with music and with chance, John Cage, the composer, has tried his hand at painting. The gestural and airy and vaguely Oriental results of his experiment are now on view at the Phillips Collection. They're distressingly conventional. What makes "John Cage/New River Watercolors" such a disappointing show is its unrelenting chic.

Cage's pictures were produced by painting around river rocks. The placement of the rocks and the colo...

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