I was hoping the Robert Colescott exhibition at The New Museum, up through Oct. 9, would bring me to some resolution on my opinions towards this artist. Though certainly giving me more depth, understanding and even respect, I'm still not quite sure what I feel. Before seeing the show, I'd felt Colescott was an ambitious painter, making incredibly complex compositions of deeply imaginative work with tremendous force and volumetric movement, but also one missing the rigor of construction that I expect from such a well-known artist. As I made my way through the exhibition, I became more immersed in Colescott 's language, and more accepting of his loosenness, but never quite taken in. I felt I was watching, as against experiencing. There were a few new revelations, however. I hadn't realized how erudite Colescott was, bringing ancient mythology together with current issues of racism and global politics, or that sexual references played such an important role in his content. I'd never seen his drawings (which actually will forever tint my interpretations of Robert Louis Stevenson, whom Colescott represents as a pervert), his early work done under the mentorship of Fernand Leger, (and to my eye the most tightly constructed paintings in the show), or his last paintings, amazingly made when the artist suffered the devastating effects of Parkinson Disease.