La Cienega Area

Jim Isermann appears to be having a fine, relaxed time thinking about the simple pleasures of Op Art, the ‘60s and all those Day-Glo colors that looked so hip and cool back then. Eight wavy geometric abstractions fall under the banner of a recent spoof called Neo-Geo, a cheekily manufactured New York trend basically making fun of the pretensions of T-square abstraction.

Isermann’s paintings actually do their optical drills in pretty good order, but when he renders a couple in motel carpet fabric and smirks at Frank Stella in a series of oval targets with empty centers it’s pretty easy to tell where his tongue is. When we encounter art that refuses to take itself seriously, we are unburdened of the obligation to take it seriously. What a relief. (Kuhlenschmidt-Simon Gallery, 9000 Melrose Ave., to July 15.)