DOWNTOWN

Like a ship’s sail stretched into a curve by a brisk wind, Brian Skelton’s welded steel sculptures arch into space. Skelton’s basic recipe calls for three ingredients: a large concave geometric shell, a smaller industrial shape that sits before the shell like a shadow and a thin metal rope that snakes upward connecting the top of the shell with a supporting base. Mid-size floor pieces with a goofy elegance evocative of Russian Constructivist theater, the three works are painted Yves Klein Blue and that lurid color lends them a lighthearted whimsicality that’s at odds with the weighty material they’re made of. Also on view are three wax maquettes for large bronze casts. Alternately suggestive of tiny caves and decayed human body parts, these little models have a creepy organic quality. (Oranges and Sardines Gallery, 320 Omar Ave., to July 18.)