Over the years, Cy Twombly has received few important museum exhibitions in the United States. New work has largely been seen only at Gagosian Gallery in New York, where it is shown for a month before disappearing into blue-chip private collections. So this exhibition of pieces made between 2000 and 2007, organized by James Rondeau with Twombly’s cooperation, marks a rare opportunity. It will include thirty-two works: photographs, drawings, sculptures, and large-scale paintings, all thematically related through subjects from nature. What should we expect to find? Having long since abandoned the many transgressions of his earlier work, Twombly—from the evidence we do have—is now conjuring paradise; the sheer luxuriance of his recent paintings surpasses even that of late Matisse. Of course, in these times, that may well prove to be the biggest transgression of all.
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