Drawing on the sometimes-dreamy architectural and filmic aesthetics of his native Los Angeles, Conceptual-art pioneer and playwright William Leavitt blends elements of the demonstrably real environment with some imaginary counterparts to conjure an arena for alternative, occasionally future-facing drama. Central to this exhibition are three large, setlike installations that combine, to ambiguous effect, domestic props and settings with objects and images from other, unidentified locations. On the walls around these works, oil-marker and pastel drawings depict various interior and exterior spaces in which the comfortable banalities of modern suburbia are subtly interrupted by less familiar forms.
In Telemetry Set, Leavitt explicitly references Hollywood by juxtaposing two projection screens with a hint of a Between Two Ferns–style talk show, though as the disjointed imagery rolls, we’re left to wonder just what kind of conversation the artist is envisioning. Meanwhile, The Small Laboratory presents an odd fusion of a mad scientist’s lair with a weekend cookout, and in Arctic Earth, we find ourselves looking back at the planet from the shuttered window of a house turned spacecraft. Leavitt makes his work accessible by seasoning it with ingredients from anywhere and everywhere, both concrete and delightfully ungraspable.