Aside from his erudition, Currin is also a masterful provocateur. For his first solo show at the Andrea Rosen Gallery in 1992, he presented a group of acerbic fantasy portraits of aging Park Avenue doyennes rendered in a pared-down, linear style that did the job without calling too much attention to itself. In the press release, Currin described them as "paintings of old women at the end of their cycle of sexual potential … between the object of desire and the object of loathing"—a deliberately sexist barb aimed at the "politically correct" art establishment. ("I meant it to sound mean. And I meant it to sound harsh," he later admitted.) Kim Levin, a critic for the Village Voice, took the bait. "Boycott this show," she wrote, virtually guaranteeing a minor stampede of curious readers heading downtown to see what the fuss was about.