"Transcendental Smoothie" This is a visual feast, literally. For the exhibit's main work, Forced Fields, Mary Magsamen and Stephan Hillerbrand have loaded the gallery with hanging translucent balloons, through which video is projected, creating spherical screens that display (among other things) one of their children making star-shaped cookies. The video is shot from under a sheet of Plexiglas, over which the child cuts a slab of dough with a cookie cutter. It's a brilliant effect; occasionally we see the little girl's eye through the star-shaped hole left by the cookie cutter, and projected through the hanging balloons it creates a warped starscape across the room. The images create a lysergic world of childlike incorruptibility. The ever-present drone of crickets emphasizes a state of uninterrupted bliss. Other works somewhat miss the mark. Let's Get Married features three separate frames, again shot from underneath Plexiglas, in which Magsamen and Hillerbrand devour slices of bread, peanut butter and jelly. They lap it all up using only their mouths, smearing it and smushing it all over the glass. Then the video reverses, so it looks like they're regurgitating it back out. It's really fun to watch, but it's unclear why Magsamen and Hillerbrand feel they need to augment their imagery with spoken words — basically the words "peanut butter and jelly" plugged into different phrases. It makes you want to turn off the music and the words and just look at the pictures and listen to the crickets. Through September 27. Lawndale Art Center, 4912 Main, 713-528-5858. — TS
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