While Chris Burden has been primarily associated with performance work, in his Big Wheel he has successfully integrated the concepts of art as “object” and art as performance. The piece consists of the artist’s 250 cc Benelli motorcycle resting against the front of a 6,000 pound, 8-foot diameter, cast iron flywheel which is supported by a 6-by-6 inch lumber frame. The back wheel of the bike sits in a specially designed stand which raises it off the floor, thereby allowing it to reach speeds from 60 to 70 mph without inducing forward motion. As the bike accelerates, it rotates the flywheel which

In two concurrent shows, DeWain Valentine perpetuates old interests and ambitiously tackles other issues long associated with modernist painting. Using thin, long and precariously sharp sheets of glass which are joined together with semi-transparent silicone adhesive, Valentine has created a number of larger-than-life-size structures which approximate functional architectural elements. They include a series of free standing towers, a beam connecting two walls, an arch and a stunning double pyramid; they present a notable shift away from the solidity and density of the previous work in glass and

In his new work, a series of small shelters deposited at sites around downtown Los Angeles’ skid row, JON PETERSON has neatly grafted function and relevance onto the sadly barren tree of public sculpture, thereby infecting both the milk-fed G.S.A. branch and the adjustably megalomaniacal site-specific one.

Peterson’s work is small, portable, and playfully painted in bright primary colors. It is made to cover one supine body in relative comfort or more if desired. So much for scale, site-specificty, and color.

Intended as refuges for urban vagrants, Peterson made and put out four of the shelters