Faces to Watch in ’96 : The Year’s in Their Hands : Well, maybe not just theirs (notice we don’t list Jim Carrey). But these artists and entertainers--some you know, some you don’t--are most likely to make some kind of splash in ’96. Ready? Everybody into the pool. : ART : Lari Pittman

Since 1982, in sequential series of brash and exuberant paintings typically made on mahogany panels, Lari Pittman has shaken up countless received ideas within contemporary artistic discourse. Now, at 44, the Los Angeles-based artist has arguably become the most significant American painter of his generation.

On June 23, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art will open a mid-career survey exhibition of Pittman’s work, featuring about 40 major paintings and culminating with the imposing, five-panel tour de force shown in November at Stuart Regen Projects. Sex, mortality, freedom and social equality are some of the old-fashioned subjects brilliantly injected with revivified power and wit in Pittman’s highly decorated, image-packed paintings.

The show also marks a second coup for LACMA, which was likewise the site for 1994’s mid-career survey of artist Mike Kelley. The Museum of Contemporary Art, which might be thought of as the logical presenter for both shows, has missed out on the two most significant new American artists working in L.A. in the past decade.