Realism and Imagination Coexist in ‘Drawings V’

Realism is often ridiculed for going to great lengths to depict what we can see withour bare eyes. Its detractors, who usually prefer the abstract perambulations of Conceptual art or the mesmerizing effects of abstract painting, treat Realism as if it were a unified style. The thought is that it’s the work of uninspired artists whose sworn duty it is to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

At Koplin Gallery, “Drawings V” dispels such prejudice. Demonstrating that there are as many types of Realism as there are artists practicing it, this biannual summer group show (now in its fifth installment, it’s becoming something of a tradition) reveals that the discipline required to make realistic images yields a surprising amount of artistic freedom. Far from limiting artists to tried-and-true formulas, fidelity to the visible world leaves plenty of room for talent and imagination.

Among the 82 drawings by 44 artists displayed, the human figure predominates. The greatest number, the largest and many of the best works are riveting portraits and equally engaging explorations of anonymous human bodies.

Bill Vuksanovich’s pair of pictures give photography a run for its money. These seemingly straightforward portraits of a young man and a young woman bring so much nuanced vitality to snapshot-style poses that they take on a life of their own.

Steven Assael’s exquisite depictions of nude women borrow freely from film noir and Renaissance painting, forming a type of Gothic Mannerism with a chilly contemporary feel. Less theatrical are Martha Mayer Erlebacher’s more intimate drawings of women in three-quarter profile, their classical postures providing a structure that highlights both their individual peculiarities and the artist’s skills with a pencil. Ira Korman’s charcoal drawing of an old man’s weathered face treats the human body as if it were a geological formation, each deliberately drawn line seemingly scratched into rock.

Icy perfectionism suffuses David Ligare’s idealized heads, whose precisely inscribed lines are a model of restraint. In contrast, Susan Hauptman’s two large-scale self-portraits tower over viewers, amplifying their impact with overwrought emotionalism. In each, the intensity of Hauptman’s expression makes the odd events unfolding around her seem even more mysterious, part of a supernatural world that is unsettling to visit for any length of time.

Kerry James Marshall’s depictions of black supermodels with stylish 1960s hairdos do not need to leave the real world to capture haunting dramas, whose ongoing intrigue they capture with bittersweet poignancy. Don Bachardy’s washy acrylics embody the delicacy and lightness of dreams. Like a favorite pair of jeans, these swiftly rendered portraits provide pleasures that are undiminished by their familiarity. Similarly, Patty Wickman’s enchanting drawings find seemingly religious significance in mundane experiences.

Landscapes and pictures of animals round out the show. Among the former, Jacci den Hartog’s watercolor-enhanced gardens stand out for their energized vigor. Among the latter, the most memorable images include Howard Warshaw’s pictures of frolicking beasts, Robbie Conal’s wide-eyed pets and Chris Finley’s stark drawing of a giant chipmunk tied to a man’s leg.

In the right hands, Realism doesn’t just depict the world; it makes you see it anew.

* Koplin Gallery, 464 N. Robertson Blvd., (310) 657-9843, through Sept. 2. Closed Sundays and Mondays.

How to Read Them?: Despite the prevalence of printed words and bland, black-and-white images, “Library” is a surprisingly divisive exhibition. At Margo Leavin Gallery, some of the best works in the 18-artist show counsel viewers to stop reading. Others intone that reading is everything. And still others stake out a relativist position, sensibly asserting that reading and looking are complementary endeavors, each as useful as the other in coming to understand the world.

John Baldessari’s 8-by-10-foot diptych began as a pair of photographs, each depicting a slightly open book that stands upright as if guarding some invisible realm of knowledge. However, both images have been almost completely covered with a hastily smeared blob of white paint.

Recalling the goopy fluid typists use to correct mistakes, Baldessari’s abstract additions suggest that words only take you so far: When it comes to visual art, knowledge enters the picture by other means, whose silence does not imply any lack of sophistication. Fine pieces by Delia Brown, Sarah Charlesworth and Giulio Paolini flesh out this proposition, outlining various differences between seeing and reading.

In contrast, Joseph Kosuth’s metal plaques, on which heavy-duty philosophical claims have been etched, sound like the Bible read by a pompous orator. But unlike the Gospel of John, in which “the word” merely occupies the beginning of the world, in Kosuth’s art it is everything--the beginning, middle and end of all forms of thinking. A second piece juxtaposes a quote from Heidegger with a “Calvin and Hobbes” comic strip, to indict viewers for having short attention spans.

David Bunn’s books, made from outdated card catalogs, and Sherrie Levine’s photographs of Atget’s photographs of Parisian libraries exploit short attention spans to bring a touch of humor to Kosuth’s solemnity. But behind their superficial playfulness, they adhere to his narrow-minded claims with the fervor of acolytes.

Alexis Smith’s even-handed pieces from the late 1970s put things into perspective by letting words and pictures rub shoulders until sparks fly in the mind’s eye. A simple drawing, titled “Her sins were scarlet but her books were read,” demonstrates that while what we read may color what we do, reading is not the same as doing.

Likewise, a long, horizontal Smith collage uses Whitman’s “Leaves of Grass” as a plain-spoken foundation for Pop art, in which ordinary things embody extraordinary meanings. Smart works by Amy Adler, John Cage, Larry Johnson and Allen Ruppersberg follow suit, using words and images to form wholes that are greater than the sum of their parts.

* Margo Leavin Gallery, 812 N. Robertson Blvd., (310) 273-0603, through Aug. 31. Closed Sundays and Mondays.

Humble Origins: Steve DeGroodt’s four sculptures and six drawings at Richard Heller Gallery are wonderfully humble things. At a time when the art that makes the most noise seems to get the most attention, it’s refreshing to see works whose need for attention is exceeded by their formal authority. So even-keeled are the L.A.-based artist’s abstract configurations of ordinary materials that they make a lot of life seem like a tempest in a teacup.

Time slows down before DeGroodt’s collages. Each consists of a handful of overlapped sections of clean white paper and a large, gray envelope or two, on which he has painted a few interlinked curves in black acrylic or stripes in pale yellow. In one, part of a shirt collar adds a semicircle of green. In others, swatches of synthetic fabric cut from sports uniforms provide splashes of orange-yellow and passages of cool blue.

Each of DeGroodt’s drawings is actually several drawings in one. Laid out in casual, relaxed compositions, their components look as if they were shuffled, like a deck of cards, until the artist found an arrangement that suited his mood. A sense of ad hoc adaptability--or potentially infinite rearrangeability--takes shape in these unpretentious pieces, which are anything but precious.

DeGroodt’s sculptures fall into two categories: rows of cardboard boxes that have been neatly wrapped in old clothes as if they were presents, and loose sections of fabric that either have been push-pinned to the wall or suspended, like flags, from lines of monofilament. Both emphasize their provisional, temporary nature, which will last only as long as they’re cared for.

All that distinguishes DeGroodt’s art from what is commonly found in recycling bins or wastebaskets is the formal order he has brought to it. When that no longer holds his works together, there’s nothing left--not even any regrets. This unsentimental wisdom gives them their fragile beauty.

* Richard Heller Gallery, 2525 Michigan Ave., Bergamot Station, Santa Monica, (310) 453-9191, through Sept. 16. Closed Sundays and Mondays.

Get Real: “Artificial Real” begins with an interesting idea: that modern life is so saturated with images that it’s getting more difficult to distinguish what’s real from what’s fake. Unfortunately, the works in this eight-artist exhibition at Low Gallery are too unsophisticated to offer much more than cliched reflections on the relationship between artifice and reality.

Shot through a chain-link fence, Dean Sameshima’s seven photographs of a mural depicting a pristine natural landscape contrast culture and nature in a remedial manner. Likewise, Naotaka Hiro’s manipulated videotape of a walk through a landscape fails to transport viewers beyond the obvious, merely illustrating the rudiments of a city kid’s unfamiliarity with the countryside.

Other works aspire to engage commercial culture but fall far short of its intoxicating blend of anything-goes fantasy and cutthroat accounting. Spelling out the words “Alienation” and “Unreal,” Henrick Plenge-Jakobsen’s gold-leafed gouaches look like the signs for trendy stores that have gone bust, their market niches even narrower than anticipated.

Daniel Pflumm’s untitled light box--a white oval surrounded by a red border with scalloped edges--resembles a comic strip’s empty thought bubble. And Karen Kimmel’s pair of chair-like sculptures, which force their occupants to sit with legs together or apart, manipulates our bodies without giving our minds much to mull over.

Nicoletta Munroe’s crisp Cibachromes stand out because they are nearly as slick as the print advertisements they strive to criticize. However, these images of elaborate stage sets and all the trappings of big-budget photo shoots are too distrustful of any kind of illusion to get beyond a type of mass-media critique that was popular in the 1960s.

Today, artifice is so much a part of everyday existence that simply pointing it out is not very interesting. One difference between bad art and good is that the former imitates life, while the latter gets life to imitate it.

* Low Gallery, 9050 and 9052 Santa Monica Blvd., (310) 281-2691, through Sept. 2. Closed Sundays and Mondays.