ART REVIEW : A Look at Our Small, Nasty World

If “It’s a Small World,” as the title of Karen Carson’s installation at Rosamund Felsen Gallery merrily proclaims, then it’s also quite a nasty one--a world fueled by equal parts fear and loathing, guns and money.

Since most of us are already woefully aware of this, Carson’s “ironic” reinterpretation of the Disney-esque myth of a global brotherhood (feminism hasn’t hit the Magic Kingdom yet)--a place where we all love, respect and feed one another--lacks real bite. What’s interesting, though, is that while this work is by no means as bland as the master narrative it seeks to indict, “It’s a Small World” betrays a sizable debt to the master. For like Disney, Carson relies upon bold colors, cartoon-like imagery, an all-encompassing environment and the complicity of a like-minded audience to communicate a not necessarily blistering message.

Suspended from the ceiling on nearly invisible wires is a collection of found globes of various sizes, each painted to illustrate a particular theme. “Weaponry” is a large globe covered with technicolor missiles, guns and explosives; “Pollution” is a tiny sphere enlivened with death’s heads; “The Scream” pays homage to international urban Angst by replicating in various sizes and hues Munch’s well-known, open-mouthed, cadaverous alter ego. Painted directly on the walls surrounding this miniature solar system is a cavalcade of gargantuan male and female angels. Instead of celebrating purity, however, these figures peddle the pleasures of sexual excitation--flying, twirling, flashing their genitals, and grabbing at one another in all sorts of dangerous places.

In a smaller room, these angels are transmuted into tiny nudes, who cavort inside self-consciously garish frames. Drawn, sprayed and collaged onto paper in highly symmetrical, if not necessarily harmonious configurations, these images wed the Kama Sutra to Busby Berkeley, and filter the whole through a pair of rococo glasses.

What they seem to want to do is offer a satiric commentary on the buried narratives of so-called “decorative” art. Yet in the end, they are far more decorative than satirical. As with the painted globes, one suspects these images will be easily recuperated into the very system they purport to question. This leaves one feeling a bit uncomfortable--and more troubling yet, too comfortable--in what is admittedly their very appealing presence.

Rosamund Felsen Gallery, 8525 Santa Monica Blvd.,(310) 652-9172, through June 13. Closed Sundays and Mondays.