The talking pictures

Luigi CARBONI, an Italian painter, paced between rooms at the Patricia Faure Gallery on a recent afternoon. His paintings had been held up in customs, delaying the installation of the show, and Carboni wanted a cigarette.

In another corner of Santa Monica’s Bergamot Station, at Track 16, a show of political posters was still being put up. Across the yard, William Turner and Robert Berman were meeting in Turner’s gallery to go over the last details of the program for the Absolut L.A. International Biennial Invitational, a five-week art fair that also includes performances, lectures and, of course, parties. The catalog had yet to be printed. But Turner and Berman were confident that everything would come together in time.

This week, work by more than 200 international artists goes on view in galleries and art institutions from Chinatown to Venice, as part of the 10th L.A. International.

“Art fairs can get really stale,” said Turner, sitting outside his gallery with Berman. The L.A. International, on the other hand, “gets this rock concert and blockbuster response.” In previous years, he said with parental pride, attendance for the opening parties had tied down the Santa Monica Freeway. Turner and Berman, the organizers of this year’s fair, were expecting nothing less than a logjam for the various openings. Based on years past, they project between 50,000 and 60,000 people will visit at least one of the participating galleries over the five-week run.

On the most fundamental level, the L.A. International is a marketplace -- a bazaar that gives galleries an opportunity to showcase emerging international artists, and, they hope, sell their work. For visitors -- with or without money to spend -- it is an opportunity to sample an eclectic array of contemporary art from more than 30 countries.

The fair grew out of Art/LA, which was held from 1986 to 1993 at the downtown convention center. In its first year, the L.A. International had 43 participating galleries. With 75 galleries this year, it may not be Basel yet, but, says Turner, “it’s a unique model.”

Art fairs are often held in convention centers or similar large spaces. L.A. International, however, involves galleries making their space available to international artists and/or galleries. Promotion, catalogs and other expenses are funded through sponsorships and contributions from foreign consulates.

It’s not just about art sales.

“It’s a new platform for international dialogue,” said Turner, whose gallery will be showing photographs and sculpture by Guatemalan artist Lissie Habie and paintings by Canadians Bill Porteous and Doug Stone. Berman, the co-organizer, will show work by Ewoud Van Rijn from the Netherlands, Christine Rusche from Germany and Ivan Fayard from France.

Many emerging international artists had their first show at the fair; says Turner: “It provides a lot of exposure for these artists.”

Several shows and events have a political bent.

“Where We Come From,” an exhibition at the Frumkin-Duval Gallery in Santa Monica, features work by Emily Jacir, a Palestinian artist with American citizenship who contacted displaced Palestinians around the world, asking them for wishes she could fulfill in the occupied territories. (As an American citizen, she could travel more freely.)

The 27 wishes (“visit my mother, hug and kiss her,” and “place flowers on my mother’s grave”) are displayed on the wall as text to accompany her photos of their fulfillment. The gallery also plans to show a video by Jacir, “Crossing Surda,” an illegal recording of her crossing checkpoints twice daily, at one point being held at gunpoint by an Israeli soldier.

Track 16 will exhibit two concurrent shows: “Le Dernier Cri: Legendary Publishers of the International Underground,” prints, paintings, drawings and animated film, as well as “East-West Graphics of Resistance,” posters by U.G. Sato of Japan and Lex Drewinski of Poland.

“Light Among Shadows” at 18th Street Arts Center in Santa Monica is an exhibition celebrating Orlando Letelier, a Chilean politician in exile who was assassinated in a 1976 Washington car bombing by killers connected to Gen. Augusto Pinochet’s military government, and American co-worker, Ronni Moffitt, also slain in the blast. Letelier’s son, Francisco Letelier, who lives in Venice, Calif., is among the featured artists in the show, which blends historical photographs and contemporary visual art.

In addition to individual gallery shows, several special events and performances will take place during the fair. On Aug. 2 at 18th Street Arts Center, Tom Hayden and Jackson Browne are among the panel speakers participating in “Over Troubled Waters: Cultural Response and Human Rights,” about art and globalization.

Curated by artist Lauren Bon, “International Unplugged” will feature work by six artists and performances by Beyond Baroque, the Venice-based literary arts group. The event will be presented in an exhibition space at Bamboo Plaza in Chinatown.

At Track 16 on July 25, poster artists Robbie Conal, Micah Wright, Carrol Wells, Shepard Fairey and Barbara Carrasco will talk about the art of dissent.

PREPARING for his show, Carboni stood in front of his paintings: two world maps and a formalized garden/forest. The map paintings are layered images in which foreground and background have been collapsed.

“The reason for using the map, it’s such a recognizable image,” he said, with the help of a translator, an assistant at the gallery. “It’s an absolute concept.”

Absolute, perhaps, but slightly disorienting, with concentric circles and grids painted on top of the maps, which appear unstable, their outlines repeated.

The dizzying form is meant to imply the constantly changing boundaries and circumstances in the world, Carboni said. A fitting starting point for the international show.

At the entrance were two other paintings -- white acrylic canvases painted with glue and sprayed with sand. Decorative -- featuring designs of bees, flowers and a human skeleton -- the white-on-white paintings still stood on the floor.

“It’s a sensitive approach to painting,” said Carboni. “A rich design but the result is minimalist.”

Next door, at the Frank Lloyd Gallery, the owner was installing work by five British artists. Work by Gordon Baldwin -- ceramic sculptures with painterly marks on them -- were in a group on the floor. On a pedestal next to them sat a large, untitled earthenware vase by Kenya-born Magdalene Odundo.

Lloyd gingerly picked up “Blown Away Vase ‘On the Edge,’ ” a blue ceramic vase with a multicolored geometric design by Elizabeth Fritsch, and brought it into the main gallery.

He was thinking of how to display it in the glass case. “Like this, perhaps?”

Visitors will find out.

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Absolut L.A. galleries and programs

Here are a few picks from the five-week Absolut L.A. International Biennial Art Invitational.

A full list of galleries and programs can be found at: www.lainternational.org:

Italian painter Luigi Carboni with

Piero Manzoni, Pier Paolo Calzolari and Lucio Fontana

Where: Patricia Faure Gallery

Bergamot Station Arts Center, 2525 Michigan Ave. B7, Santa Monica

When: Until Aug. 9

Info: (310) 449-1479

Austrian artist Christoph Schmidberger

Where: Mark Moore Gallery

2525 Michigan Ave. A1,

Santa Monica

When: Until Aug. 23

Info: (310) 453-3031

Jerusalem Print Workshop

Where: Tobey C. Moss Gallery

7321 Beverly Blvd., Los Angeles

When: Until Aug. 30

Info: (323) 933-5523

“Where We Come From,”

work by Palestinian artist Emily Jacir

Where: Frumkin-Duval Gallery

2525 Michigan Ave. T1,

Santa Monica

When: Until Aug. 16

Info: (310) 453-1850

“British Ceramics: Five Artists”

Where: Frank Lloyd Gallery

2525 Michigan Ave. B5b,

Santa Monica

When: Until Aug. 16

Info: (310) 264-3866

Brazilian sculptor Edgar de Souza

Where: L.A. Louver

45 N. Venice Blvd.,

Venice

When: Until Aug. 30

Info: (310) 822-4955

“Le Dernier Cri” and “East-West Graphics of Resistance,” (a group show of international artists)

Where: Track 16 Gallery

2525 Michigan Ave. C1,

Santa Monica

When: Until Aug. 16

Info: (310) 264-4678