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Article: The Ripe Mysteries of Odilon Redon; A Powerfully Evocative Array Of Images at the Phillips
- Article from:
- The Washington Post
- Article date:
- April 23, 1988
- Author:
CopyrightThis material is published under license from the Washington Post. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Washington Post. (Hide copyright information)
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You can almost hear his shadowed beings, his floating skulls and
severed heads: They gibber and they squeak. You can almost smell the
flowers he painted late in life: His blood-red poppies and anemones
carry in their perfume some underscent of spiders' legs, and
moth-wing dust, and death.
The Frenchman Odilon Redon (1840-1916) conjured the invisible,
scents and sounds and mysteries. Seventy Redons-all drawn from the
collection of New York's Ian Woodner-are now on view at the Phillips
Collection. Wandering among them is like drifting through a dream.
The exhibition pulsates. Redon's otherworldly beings are
frequently translucent, his jugs of flowers levitate and hover in the
air. A ...