LONG BEACH

A sculptural installation by John Paul Jones titled “Altered Sticks” concerns itself with the way that architectural forms cut into the sky. Defining space that is at once concrete and empty, these soaring testimonies to corporate power are ultimately dwarfed by the infinite heavens. Jones makes a handful of points about history, order and form in his spare, symmetrical structures of pale wood. Designed mainly on a vertical axis, these fragile Tinker Toy objects resemble streamlined kachinas one moment, a Renaissance cathedral the next. Flip-flopping back and forth, the work never loses its balance and exudes the fluid, glancing sense of motion of a pencil line. Jones tips his hand as to his influences with titles referring to Giacometti, Frank Lloyd Wright, Chartres Cathedral and Antonio Gaudi, among others. It’s a peculiar melange of ideas that results in work that’s a bit too weird to be decorative, but not quite weird enough to be avant garde. (The Works Gallery, 2740 E. Broadway, to March 29.)