“Clemente”
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum | New York
Let me confess at the outset that I was genuinely disappointed by Francesco Clemente’s exhibition at the Guggenheim, but not, perhaps, for the right reasons. Certainly, I was disappointed not because one expects better from the Guggenheim (one doesn’t) or because we deserve better (we don’t), or even because I expected to see a serious retrospective exhibition (I didn’t). What I expected was a fragrance, an essence, as advertised by the exhibition’s trademark title, “Clemente”—as if murmured by one of those Euro-teens who trip up to you in Bloomingdale’s, squeeze an atomizer, and becloud you