Polemical plus pensive
By Victoria Dalkey -- Bee Art Correspondent

Southern California artist Dean DeCocker's cool, aloof sculptures at Jay Jay are almost diametrically opposed to Garcia's hot, impassioned works. In contrast to Garcia's socially engaged stance, DeCocker, who teaches at Claremont Graduate University, dwells firmly in the realm of art for art's sake.

Made of materials ranging from plexiglass and powder-coated metal to wood and fiberglass, his reductive wall sculptures and floor pieces draw inspiration from architectural and aeronautical design.
Sometimes suggesting fragments of airplane wings, propellers and venting systems, they are intriguing but oddly mute and self-contained works.

In "Shore Defenses," DeCocker places found fiberglass nose cones, which resemble megaphones, low on the gallery wall attached to a complex metal support. Suggesting an early warning system for a low-tech military installation, it's a witty but enigmatic piece that sets the tone for the show. "Sea Plane Tender" is a series of clear plexiglass rectangles with matte stripes that cast fascinating, nearly three-dimensional shadows on the wall.

Some of DeCocker's works involve minimal arrangements of undulating strings of plastic ovals and dots that seem primarily formal. But the forms take on an almost romantic quality in "Dutch East Indies," which suggests waves and wisps of clouds. An antic sense of humor informs "Dauntess," in which green dots peek through holes in white plastic rectangles, playfully quizzing our visual perceptions.
"Liberty" is the most emotive piece on view. Its warm wood and fiberglass forms depart from the chilly tone of the other pieces in the show. Suggesting the human figure, the bonelike, skeletal forms remind one of Stephen de Staebler's ceramic sculptures of shins and feet that seem excavated from archeological digs.

Also up at Jay Jay are decorative works by Richard Martinez that hover between painting and sculpture. Martinez received his master's of fine arts from the University of California, Davis and teaches at the University of Texas in San Antonio. His ornate, baroque canvases combine passages of paint from a dissonant palette, swiped and dripped over romantically rich backgrounds on which vinelike fronds and floral motifs unfurl.

In "Mojave" he places a ribbonlike swirl of tacky blue and a delicate lavender frond against warm tones suggestive of desert landscapes. "Silver I" combines shadowy, black forms with leaden silver paint in a puckish painting that is simultaneously ugly and lovely. Ranging from the exuberant "Ocean Day" to the ghostly and evocative "Float," Martinez's works are trendy hybrids that walk a tenuous line between painterly abstraction and campy kitsch.

Works by Joan Moment, Mike Stevens, Suzanne Adan, Tom Monteith and others are now on view in Jay Jay's new annex, a warehouselike space across the parking lot from the gallery at 5524 Elvas Ave. The space is a bit rough, but promises to be an exciting addition to Jay Jay, with ample room for large paintings and sculptures. Don't forget to look in on it when you visit the gallery.

Dean DeCocker sculptures, Richard Martinez paintings
WHERE: Jay Jay, 5520 Elvas Ave.
WHEN: 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Wednesdays-Saturdays, through June 25
INFORMATION: (916) 453-2999