Lie down, roll over -- but never beg

The peculiar tendency of dog owners to resemble their pets takes on an unsettling significance in Marc Joseph’s “American Pitbull,” a smart and subtly powerful series of photographs at Western Project exploring the culture surrounding this controversial breed. Portraits of the dogs themselves line one wall of the gallery: eight 40- by 30-inch photographs of handsome, strategically bred creatures with names like “Hunk,” “Gucci,” “Felony,” “Moody Bitch” and “Boomslang,” all posing against pale wood paneling, presumably on display at a show or other such event.

On an adjacent wall, a 48- by 60-inch photograph portrays three large, shirtless men in gym shorts, one of whom has “Pit Bull” tattooed across his shoulder blades, lumbering away from the camera into darkness. Illuminated in the sphere of a flash, they look like animals caught in the headlights of a car.

The similar color scheme -- a bland interplay of tan and black -- underscores a vague sense of affinity between the groups of bodies: namely, a raw, corporeal sort of power. The men aren’t nearly as sleek or as fit as the dogs. They’re drifting into middle age and decidedly fleshy around the middle. But they exude a consonant air of bottled aggression, a simmering potential for violence.

It is in this careful attention to the physicality of his subjects, both human and canine, that Joseph begins to reveal the emotional, psychological and social complexity of their relationship to one another. Moving through the show, one begins to see the dogs as not only a reflection but an extension of the men (and they are mostly men here) who breed them -- a sublimation of instincts and impulses that have been denied, thwarted or blunted by the pressures of a world over which these men have little control.

The pit bull is a manifestation of strength, power and disciplined ferocity. To cultivate such a creature is, in a sense, to emulate these qualities; to master it is to master some part of oneself.

Perhaps the most startling image in the show -- at least to one not accustomed to the mechanics of breeding -- depicts two dogs, one tied into a wooden armature, in the act of mating, with one man bent over them, essentially guiding the process along with his hands, while another crouches observantly at his side. This strange tangle of bodies encapsulates the intimacy, even tenderness, of the breeder’s relationship to his dogs and his total supremacy over them. Breeding is ultimately, one realizes, a way of playing God, of guiding creation according to one’s own design.

The photographs, all drawn from Joseph’s 2003 book, “American Pitbull,” are accompanied in the show by a more recent video consisting of a series of short, unnarrated vignettes portraying individual men talking about or interacting with their dogs. It is an illuminating companion to the exhibition, fleshing out many of the personalities involved. The video offers a richer sense of their social and geographical environment and a reminder that when it comes down to it, these dogs are just dogs -- as frolicsome, affectionate, cheerful and loyal as any others.

The last of the vignettes, however, is harrowing.

In it, we see a very pretty young dog on a kitchen floor, eagerly executing a simple stream of commands: sit, lie down, attack. The objects of the dog’s fury are merely cardboard boxes, but the viciousness with which he or she tears into them is alarming.

Joseph leaves such incidents open-ended, and his restraint is among the show’s strengths. One can’t help but think of the military and other discipline-oriented institutions designed to similarly marshal the furies of men. “American Pitbull” is documentary photography at its best: insightful, eloquent, poignant, compassionate and disturbing.

Western Project, 3830 Main St., Culver City, (310) 838-0609, through July 9. Closed Sunday and Monday.

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The everyday car show

Meg Madison began “Surface Streets” -- an absorbing series of photographs at Kristi Engle Gallery -- in the wake of a minor car accident. It’s the sort of experience that tends to shake up one’s view of the world, if only temporarily, and Madison has taken advantage of that, producing a poetic visual essay, which explores that most common of daily activities -- driving -- with fresh eyes.

Working through a stockpile of outdated Polaroid film, Madison took one picture every time she got into or out of a car for a period of two weeks, labeling each with the date, time and, in some cases, purpose of the trip (“for dog food,” “for more hair dye”). For the exhibition, she digitally enlarged the images -- nearly 150 in all -- and presents them as midsized prints, hung in an even row around the perimeter of the gallery.

Most of the images document details of the cars: a taillight, a fender, a reflection in a window. Others look beyond, to the sidewalk or street. Some are clear and easily identifiable; others are blurred or taken from extremely close up, and virtually abstract.

Thanks to the quality of the outdated film (and probably some degree of digital manipulation), the colors are rich and strange, with the palette dominated by yellows, oranges and greens suggestive of some sort of chemical spill. The individual images are invariably striking and often quite beautiful. The effect is stirringly poetic: an impressionistic exploration of an experience we take for granted.

Kristi Engle Gallery, 453 S. Spring St., Suite 451, Los Angeles, (213) 629-2358, through Aug. 13. Closed Sunday through Wednesday.

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Lingering in the light

The women in D.J. Hall’s paintings are idealized but not exactly likable. They’re white, thin, tan and rich; they lounge around swimming pools, drink martinis and seem to largely ignore their children. If they were characters in a movie, one imagines they’d be sleeping with one another’s husbands.

It’s tempting to read an element of satire into Hall’s presentation of these characters -- all models she’s hired, dressed and meticulously arranged -- but that may be less a matter of the artist’s intention than a sort of diplomatic neutrality. At the height of a successful, 30-year career, she clearly has little interest in alienating either those who see themselves in this world (potential collectors, perhaps) or the rest of us, who don’t.

Her primary interest, in any case, is not the character of these decadent beauties but the light that surrounds them. This is the thing that makes her show of recent work at Koplin Del Rio Gallery dazzling, even to a skeptic like myself.

Whether it be the dry, white, afternoon sunshine of the Southern Californian desert (all of the works seem to take place around Palm Springs), the gentle pink of dusk, the cool, blue glow of a swimming pool at night, the romantic illumination of a plump paper lantern, of Christmas lights wound around the trunk of a palm tree, or a sparkler tracing circles in the night air, she renders light with breathtaking precision. The paintings, especially the big ones, are bright, lush and confident and would be a treat for the eyes however idle the content.

Koplin Del Rio Gallery, 464 N. Robertson Blvd., West Hollywood, (310) 657-9843, through July 9. Closed Sunday and Monday.

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More power to the people

The 10th Amendment to the Constitution states: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” Jennifer Nelson’s “10th Amendment Project,” named after said article, is curiously enough a love story -- or rather, a marriage story, which is not always the same thing.

The work consists of two roughly 45-minute videos, each projected in its own specially built, narrowly triangular room, depicting scenes from a fictional marriage being enacted and filmed on a sound stage. Occasionally the footage slips into a finalized format and we view a scene as it might appear in an actual feature. More often we see the actors floating amid a swarm of camera operators and technicians, sometimes performing, sometimes discussing the scene, sometimes just waiting.

The conceit behind the work is that the power structure governing the production is nonhierarchical -- i.e., there is no centralized governing power and any participant, from actor to grip, can propose changes to any aspect of the scene at any time. They do occasionally -- though it’s difficult, without knowing the original script, to appreciate or evaluate the effect.

It is an intriguing formal exercise, but the underlying emotional narrative -- to the extent that it’s implied at all -- tends to get lost amid the confusion of bodies, voices and equipment. The principal pleasure of the work is simply floating through the chaos and appreciating the occasional moments of clarity and poetry.

Carl Berg Gallery, 6018 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles, (323) 931-6060, through July 2. Closed Sunday and Monday.