LA CIENEGA AREA

Kay Omata’s turbulent Abstract Expressionist canvases are rife with overt references to stylistic innovations by Willem de Kooning and Robert Motherwell, but her work lacks the maturity one finds in paintings by those contemporary masters. Omata’s sensitive deployment of line and mass suggests that she’s studied the tenets of AE assiduously, but she occasionally gets a bit reckless in her application of paint and the whole kit and caboodle slips out of control. Omata describes her work as being “a chronicle of my emotions and an exploration of the issue of spatial depth”--worthy enough intentions, but the central ideas behind her work are as yet a bit out of focus. (Eilat Gordin Gallery, 644 N. Robertson Blvd., to Nov. 1.)