JOSEPH AND KOZA

A Michelangelesque setting for a simple story of how Joseph, a goldsmith of Jerusalem, brought the word of God to Mazovia, a Polish realm on the Vistula, challenging the practice of human sacrifice, discrediting the witch Zla and the evil spirits she invokes, and gaining the love of Koza, the Chieftain's beautiful daughter who was to have been offered to the river. At best, the dimensions and the highly assertive design would have dwarfed the story (that they unfit the book for any specific audience goes without saying); but Mr. Shimin is simply not draftsman enough to prevail in such a style and on such a scale. His crayoned sepia figures are flaccid: there is not a bone in their bodies, no conviction in their contours. Often the anatomy is awkward, the gestures theatrical. In sum, the exhibit format is unwarranted as well as impractical.