Art review: Alexander Gorlizki at Daniel Weinberg Gallery

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Alexander Gorlizki’s paintings on paper dazzle the eye and tickle the mind. They are intricate beyond comprehension, their filament-thin lines congregating in dense, patterned fields. The works, most roughly the size of a sheet of notebook paper, spring from the traditions of Indian miniatures and manuscript illumination. They bear some op art and pop art flourishes, and indulge in a bit of surrealism for subversive effect.

The British-born Gorlizki, who lives in New York and maintains a studio of artisans in India, covers a lot of ground in his 40-plus paintings at Daniel Weinberg. Many of them are simply exquisite eye candy swirls, spirals and camouflage patterns meticulously painted in microscopic strokes with single-hair brushes. Others are representational teases, hybrids of the familiar and the fanciful. In ‘Eruption,’ for instance, a green stem springs from a crimson cone and grows into a loose lattice for oversize chrysanthemum-like blossoms.

Occasionally, Gorlizki paints atop magazine pages or photographic prints, smothering a sheet with pattern but letting eyes or lips from the underlying image show through, as if he is casting a spell then breaking it. These are the least compelling of his works, mostly because the windows he frames to another world offer such a limited, mundane view.

The paintings that borrow most heavily from Mughal miniatures fare better, their precious, antiquated form given over to motley miscellany: a princely figure seated on the back of a pigeon, a goat sucking on a hookah, a ram in formal dress holding a badminton racquet, a cow standing on the seat of a necessarily huge chair. Rendered in jewel tones with gold accents on what appears to be delicate, old paper, these spectacular little performances are spiked with anachronistic jokes and technical thrills.

– Leah Ollman

Daniel Weinberg Gallery, 6148 Wilshire Blvd., (323) 954-8425, through Dec. 19. Closed Sunday and Monday. www.danielweinberggallery.com