Alexis Rockman: A Fable for Tomorrow

American Art Museum

Smithsonian Institution

Washington, D.C., through May 8

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Alexis Rockman’s art contains worlds, said Bruce Sterling in Wired.com. Many of the 47 paintings and drawings in this first major retrospective of his work are themselves a dizzying mix of science fiction, natural history, and realist painting. The common thread is a focus on depicting nature’s realm, which the New York City–born artist, now in his late 40s, has done “with virtuosity and wit” for more than 20 years. “His work expresses deep concerns about the world’s fragile ecosystems and the tension between nature and culture,” conveyed through “vivid, even apocalyptic imagery.” The show gets its title from a chapter of Rachel Carson’s influential Silent Spring, a 1962 book on chemical pesticides that combined “two seemingly incompatible literary genres—mythical narrative and factual reportage.” Likewise, Rockman “achieves his vision through a synthesis of fantasy and empirical fact.”

The fun lies in figuring out which is which, said Michael O’Sullivan in The Washington Post. Evolution (1992) is a 24-foot-wide panorama depicting 281 creatures from an imaginary world of freakish biodiversity. “Like a centerfold out of some demented Time-Life Books science text, it’s a meticulously rendered amalgam of plants and animals both real and unreal,” featuring bizarre hybrid life forms. In The Farm (2000), a haunting comment on the perils of bioengineering, it’s even harder to pinpoint reality. “That mouse growing a human-ear-shaped piece of cartilage on its back? Very, very real. That chicken with no feathers and six wings? The part about the extra wings is made up.” In another artist’s work, such weighty environmentalism might come off as finger-wagging. Rockman, fortunately, keeps the craft “visually impressive” and his tone lighthearted and clever.