Wilshire Center

Stringing incongruent images together in a kind of dream narrative is nothing new to art. Newcomer Patrick Percy gives that old strategy elegance and power in mythic representational works that address mankind’s ties to nature and the conflict-inducing effects of civilization.

Percy has lived as a nomad, painting in Mojave and Guatemala. The sabbatical didn’t hurt his drafting skills. In one handsome untitled piece, a hooded woman in a walled enclosure turns her back on a jackal. Antlers of an ibex tipped blood-red poke through the dry soil. In “White Darkness,” tree stumps from a ravaged forest carry the eye to small figures. A blind soldier uses his walking stick to prod a native child who leads his way. These are technically accomplished, spiritually resonant narratives.

Also shown are small landscapes by longtime Los Angeles artist Olga Seem. Seem has come into her own, presenting tight, strident views of glorious nature marred by bits of mankind’s unsightly handiwork. On the downside is the heavy-handed “Crazie Pepe 2” with its smooth river boulders and limpid water reflecting nearby gang graffiti, but there are many more works--like “Puye Cliffs”--where the collision between land and man is subtle and seductive. (Space, 6015 Santa Monica Blvd., to Oct. 14.)