The stiff brackets of professional ruin barricade my friend David Schoffman behind an impermeable wall of waste. What began in gladness may not have ended in madness the way Wordsworth might have predicted but potential was left to decay and talent, once so bright, was ravaged by vanity and missed opportunity.
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| Urim and Thummim, oil on wood, 1987 |
The early work was mired by good intentions. Though far from tasteful, David's paintings from the 1980's were rife with compliant hesitation. With their rough handling and cheap materials they pretended toward mutiny but with little commitment. They were paintings that "worked" and nothing more.
By mid-career he had slid into a cesspool of intellectual quiescence.
Like a broken promise, rows of paintings and reams of drawings bore savage witness to forgetfulness and compromise. With each passing year his tepid exhibitions dazzled the innocent while disappointing the astute.
And now we are told to wait.
David insists on our patience. He vows to return and to surprise. He pleads for our indulgence as he prepares what he claims will be his ultimate tour-de-force - the 100-paneled polyptych putatively titled The Body Is His Book.
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| The Body Is His Book #67, oil on panel (in progress) |
What has already been seen of this grand project does not bode well for the future. Trickles and fragments have surfaced over the years and nothing to my eye merits either optimism nor even curiosity.
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| The Body Is His Book #33, oil on panel (in progress) |
If we give David the benefit of the doubt and he gives us nothing in return he'll deserve more than our contempt. He'll deserve our mockery.
With competence comes the worst kind of decadence. The mildewed decadence of regression and blight. David Schoffman has one last chance at redemption.
I'm not holding my breath,
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