"Joel Shapiro: Sculpture and Drawings"

It is rare today to be bowled over by formal moves, even more so by an artist thought to have been set in place years ago.

Recognizable for his semi-abstract bronze sculptures—stick forms that read as torsos, limbs and heads—Joel Shapiro offers new sculptures, particularly the wood works, that are less figurative yet more bodily. It is as if his previous figures had been flung from the roof of a building, landing in a grisly heap, or invited some of their adventurous stick friends over for an orgy. Even the new bronzes, sculptures most closely resembling prior works, attain a fragile scrappiness that older sculptures buffed out. There is a de-meanor of coolness, a telltale sign of the careful structural balance that has always been a Shapiro trademark, a trait that carries through even in brash structures riddled with energy and wayward nails. This is most apparent in a small, polychromatic work that should be a wreck, but instead is endlessly fascinating to circle and investigate. Two smaller black wood jumbles have centripetal gestalt to counter the quaintness of their scale. A particularly striking work is a clunky, burgundy wall sculpture from 2004. This piece feels solid even though it is constructed out of six blocks, little scrapped wood and nail clusters. The form is frozen in mid-churn, reaching out, and furthermore appears "life size"—though why, when it is the most abstract of the works on view, we can't explain.—Anthony Elms