La Cienega Area

Patrick Nagatani and Andree Tracey have been cheerfully bashing the specter of nuclear holocaust for several years now. If the humor of their work tends to undercut the message for dour viewers, the artists have nonetheless hit their stride as they turn out one apocalyptic scene after another through an astonishingly complex process. Offering an extreme example of the “fabricated to be photographed” genre, they not only set up situations to be photographed, they create the situations from painted backdrops, sculpture, found objects and real people. An installation in the back gallery illustrates their ingenious method.

The current show, called “Nuclear Horizons,” consists of two bodies of work: 33-by-48-inch Polaroids and 27-by-23-inch Ektacolor prints, dubbed “Radioactive Inactive Portraits.” In both suites, the artists conceive of themselves as art directors. They create theatrical settings and props for “actors” (often Nagatani with his camera) who step into the action at the last minute.

The Polaroid scenes change as nuclear blasts wreak havoc on a sushi restaurant, a hotel room or a beach scene, but we always see doom descending on complacency. In the portraits, each couch-potato subject watches television--presumably footage of a disaster--while a mushroom cloud envelopes the neighborhood or landscape that’s seen through a window. In the artists’ view, we’ll all be too busy watching The End on TV to notice that the human race has vanished along with its vanity.

Concurrently, Donald J. Butler shows boxed assemblages of collage and found objects. They are charming diversions that offer enchanting glimpses of French toys and Arcadian subjects but add little to a genre dominated by Joseph Cornell. (Koplin Gallery, 8225 1/2 Blvd., to Aug. 18.)