Page 1 Page 2 Page 3 Page 4 Page 5 Page 6 Page 7 Page 8 Page 9 Page 10 Page 11 Page 12 Page 13 Page 14 Page 15 Page 16 Page 17 Page 18 Page 19 Page 20 Page 21 Page 22 Page 23 Page 24 Page 25 Page 26 Page 27 Page 28 Page 29 Page 30 Page 31 Page 32 Page 33 Page 34 Page 35 Page 36 Page 37 Page 38 Page 39 Page 40 Page 41 Page 42 Page 43 Page 44 Page 45 Page 46 Page 47 Page 48 Page 49 Page 50 Page 51 Page 52 Page 53 Page 54 Page 55 Page 56 Page 57 Page 58 Page 59 Page 60 Page 61 Page 62 Page 63 Page 64 Page 65 Page 66 Page 67 Page 68 Page 69 Page 70 Page 71 Page 72 Page 73 Page 74 Page 75 Page 76 Page 77 Page 78 Page 79 Page 80 Page 81 Page 82 Page 83 Page 84 Page 85 Page 86 Page 87 Page 88 Page 89 Page 90 Page 91 Page 92 Page 93 Page 94 Page 95 Page 96 Page 97 Page 98 Page 99 Page 100 Page 101 Page 102 Page 103 Page 104 Page 105 Page 106 Page 107 Page 108 Page 109 Page 110 Page 111 Page 112 Page 113 Page 114 Page 115 Page 116 Page 117 Page 118 Page 119 Page 120 Page 121 Page 122 Page 123 Page 124 Page 125 Page 126 Page 127 Page 128 Page 129 Page 130 Page 131 Page 132 Page 133 Page 134 Page 135 Page 136 Page 137 Page 138 Page 139 Page 140 Page 141 Page 142 Page 143 Page 144 Page 145 Page 146 Page 147 Page 148 Page 149 Page 150 Page 151 Page 152 Page 153 Page 154 Page 155 Page 156 Page 157 Page 158 Page 159 Page 160 Page 161 Page 162 Page 163 Page 164 Page 165 Page 166 Page 167 Page 168 Page 169 Page 170 Page 171 Page 172 Page 173 Page 174 Page 175 Page 176 Page 177 Page 178 Page 179 Page 180 Page 181 Page 182 Page 183 Page 184 Page 185 Page 186 Page 187 Page 188 Page 189 Page 190 Page 191 Page 192 Page 193 Page 194 Page 195 Page 196 Page 197 Page 198 Page 199 Page 200 Page 201 Page 202 Page 203 Page 204 Page 205 Page 206 Page 207 Page 208 Page 209 Page 210 Page 211 Page 212 Page 213 Page 214 Page 215 Page 216 Page 217 Page 218 Page 219 Page 220 Page 221 Page 222 Page 223 Page 224 Page 225 Page 226 Page 227 Page 228 Page 229 Page 230 Page 231 Page 232 Page 233 Page 234 Page 235 Page 236 Page 237 Page 238 Page 239 Page 240Baudelaire correctly claimed that “style is character,” and the reverse of his aphorism is also true: character is style. Simon Raab approaches his art with the mindset and methodology of a scientist. In fact, the term “scien- tific method” involves doing exactly what Jasper Johns advised: “Do some- thing, do something to that, then do something to that.” And all the while, observe and ponder the consequences of what you’re doing. This scientific attitude includes one particularly comforting corollary. In the studio, the sensation of failure can be dispiriting; and this is especial- ly true when it comes to the fragile egos of those—generally youngsters— who are new to the game and desperate to see something original. All too easily, failure in the studio can be interpreted as personal failure. How dif- ferent things are in the laboratory, where the concept of a failed experi- ment does not exist. Sometimes in the lab, matters work out as expected, and when that hap- pens, our assumptions are verified. Also and always, however, progress is predicated upon learning what not to do. Things that don’t go as planned may be rejected as the route to a particular predetermined goal. But that must never be confused with unqualified rejection. Empiricism demands a sharp eye and an open mind. When Sir Alexander Fleming discovered those spores of mold that accidentally found their way into the Petrie dish in which he was cultivating bacteria, he might have responded in one of two ways. First, and worst, “Oh no, my culture is ruined. Toss it out.” In fact nothing went wrong, but suddenly the world went somewhere brand new. The good doctor asked himself why the bacteria refused to grow near the mold, and he found his answer in penicillin. Simon Raab’s two lives—previously a scientist and now an artist—can be encompassed by one single term: inventor. Because we live in a culture that prizes the shock of the new, a useful distinction is in order here. Successful inventions are not just novel. They manifest originality that is set to some purpose. In this critic’s experience, parleaux comprise a unique art form, though the process of painting on metal is nothing new. It dates back to the inception of oil paint, which was initially used to dec- orate furniture and armor. In the realm of high art, paintings on metal have their own special beauties; witness the peculiar luminosity that suf- fuses certain of Goya’s so-called “black paintings.” Some might argue that Raab’s use of paint on distressed steel sheets ren- ders parleaux a distant cousin to those works that the Post-Pop artist Billy Al Bengston called “Dentos.” But as far as Raab is concerned, these are undiscovered relatives, and no surprise, because Bengston’s Dentos had their moment in the Southern California sun decades ago: a flash in the pan, as it were, and a clear demonstration that novelty in and of itself rep- resents a modest virtue. Raab’s work is new, and in certain ways singular. But his ambitions go well beyond sheer novelty. The way that his images change with every step we take is, in and of itself, a source of pleasure. Moreover this delight in light invites us to speculate about the essence of our Post-Newtonian world, where what we see is relative to where we are, and nothing is necessarily what it appears to be. Some will be discomfited by the idea of Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle. Others, including Raab, will claim that quantum mechanics reverberate with theological overtones, echoing e.e. cummings’ succinct and seductive directive to “listen: there’s a hell of a good universe next door; let’s go.” Steeped in the lessons of contemporary physics, Raab’s view of these alter- nate universes is breathtaking, and it is encoded in the parleau we see. In his own words, “Light, the most fundamental existential entity, is modeled in packets, waves and spinning electric field vectors pumping their way through space. The seeming trajectories are really probabilistic combina- tions of probabilities of all possible paths in the universe.” 30