Lita Barrie reviews the recent exhibition George Condo: Entrance to the Void at Spruth Magers, Los Angeles.

Barrie writes: "Condo explains that all these paintings are 'driven by musical influence.' We see iconic images referencing Picasso, Goya and Monet in these Condo paintings, deconstructed in much the same way the late Coltrane plays Rogers and Hammerstein or Thelonious Monk plays Ellington. They deconstruct well known melodies by 'taking and copying popular melodies and turning them inside out' in the same vein as Condo arranges fragments of faces and geometrical forms. This virtuosity cannot be reduced to mere appropriation or imitation because it is so inventive, and this sets Condo’s paintings apart."