Santa Monica

To New York painter Simeon Lagodich Los Angeles is a dreamy, alabaster city on the edge of wilderness. In his paintings there is no smog, no traffic and--probably coincidentally--no people. When he paints his romantic landscapes of Dodger Stadium, the Hollywood Freeway and the Rose Bowl the artist takes the long view. From the distance of some trackless waste his paintings look down on the order and near-mythic beauty of a shining city that spreads out like ancient Rome amid green hills and soaks up the setting sun like a visionary’s dream of the promised land.

Lagodich is skillful. His colors and attention to detail give the small land-and-city scapes vibrant emotional life. The paintings subvert the American landscape tradition while appearing part of it, an interesting conceptual ploy. Here it is the city that is magnificent, not nature. Gleaming towers rising powerfully from scrub brush and empty land. Power lines span bland canyons with elegant grace, wires tinged golden by the setting sun. The images are strong enough to make one wish it were true; that civilization had really brought paradise. They are also a romantic enough view of the Southland to make us wonder how bad things have gotten in New York. (Tatistcheff Gallery, 1547 10th St., to June 3).