Sidney Goodman

Acquired directly from the artist by the present owner

New York, Terry Dintenfass Gallery
Philadelphia, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Sidney Goodman, February 2-March 31, 1996, exhibition catalogue, plate 6, illustrated in color

In good condition aside from slight rippling to canvas at top edge and lower left corner. Minute area of paint lifting with associated speck of loss lower left (by yellow shape). Under UV: no apparent in-paint.
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Sidney Goodman is one of the courageous corps of academically-trained realist painters who, emerging in the early 1960s, stuck to their principles while the art world ignored them in favor of avant-garde 'isms'; until the wind shifted back in their direction and the vigorous merit of their work could no longer be discounted.  Possessing a passion for big ideas, his paintings are tough, awesome and triumphant.

Whatever interpretation one comes to, this work must be 'read' to be appreciated.  Regarding its two-part composition via pictorial conventions like strip cartoons and stop-action photography, one interprets it as a narrative sequence: the 'action' in the left panel is followed by the 'action' on the right.  The light and shadows shift; time, thus indicated, drives the narrative.  The different head positions and postures suggest a girl emerging from childhood to puberty, if not quite womanhood.  She stands in a bathtub emptying of water; is it perhaps a reference to Venus emerging from the sea?