Lari Pittman, light and space in Los Angeles group show
Published on 08/31/2026 at 15:03 | Editorial responsibility: Rafael Müller, Editor-in-Chief AD HOC NEWS
Lari Pittman contributes a key painting to the group exhibition California Light and Space (The 21st Century Version) at David Zwirner in Los Angeles. As the gallery’s exhibition page documents, the show ran from June 4 to August 1, 2026 and featured Pittman’s 2025 work The Remedy of Analog Space & Time. David Zwirner exhibition documentation
The Los Angeles group exhibition frame
The exhibition California Light and Space (The 21st Century Version) assembled a multigenerational roster of artists connected to Los Angeles, organized by curator Helen Molesworth at David Zwirner’s Western Avenue space. The show explicitly revisited the city’s Light and Space legacy from the 1960s and 1970s through a contemporary lens. Gallery curatorial text
Alongside Lari Pittman, the artist list included figures such as Njideka Akunyili Crosby, Catherine Opie, Lauren Halsey, EJ Hill, Rodney McMillian and Lily Stockman, underscoring the show’s focus on how Los Angeles’s specific light, geography and urban fabric shape current artistic production.
How Pittman’s painting sits in the show
Pittman’s painting The Remedy of Analog Space & Time, completed in 2025, is described by David Zwirner as acrylic and spray paint on gessoed canvas on wood panel measuring 96 by 80 inches, framed slightly larger. The text emphasizes his labor-intensive way of working without preparatory sketches. Work data on Pittman’s painting
The composition folds corporate logos, punchy text, botanical forms and psychedelic imagery into a dense surface, echoing daily life in Los Angeles as chaotic yet free. This positions Pittman’s contribution as a narrative counterpoint to more strictly perceptual Light and Space histories.
All news and background on Lari Pittman
For further coverage of Lari Pittman’s exhibitions, museum surveys, market moments and institutional contexts, AD HOC NEWS aggregates current reports and background pieces.
The work core and practice
Lari Pittman is widely recognized for large, meticulously layered paintings that weave decorative patterning with political and personal narratives, often drawing on Mexican folk art, pop culture and modern design. His surfaces tend to remain legible as images yet almost diagrammatic in their dense organization. Lehmann Maupin artist overview
Series such as Decorated Chronology, Psychic Landscapes and domestic interior paintings have established a vocabulary of magic-realist spaces, where architecture, ornament and language collide, and where queer subjectivities and social histories are embedded within exuberant surfaces.
Where the artist stands now
By all accounts, Lari Pittman’s work currently occupies a strong position in institutional programming, with recent museum surveys and participation in 2026 West Coast exhibitions, while no additional date has been announced in the immediate 30-day window.
Key facts on Lari Pittman
- Artist: Lari Pittman
- Medium / Genre: Painting (magic-realist, narrative abstraction)
- Born: 1952, Glendale, California, United States
- Place(s) of practice: Studio practice based in Los Angeles
- Active since: Late 1970s, with wider recognition from the late 1980s
- Key work groups: Decorated Chronology, Psychic Landscapes, Domestic Interiors, Magic Realism
- Current/last exhibition: California Light and Space (The 21st Century Version), David Zwirner, Los Angeles, June 4 to August 1, 2026
- Major collections: Long Museum (Shanghai), Jeonnam Museum of Art (Gwangyang), Orange County Museum of Art (Costa Mesa), Whitney Museum of American Art (New York), selected North American museum collections
- Awards: Recognized through regional prizes and institutional honors; no major Turner Prize or Praemium Imperiale-type distinction documented
- Next date: currently no announced date in the 30-day window
Frequently asked questions about Lari Pittman
Where has Lari Pittman recently exhibited?
In 2026, Pittman participated in the group exhibition California Light and Space (The 21st Century Version) at David Zwirner Los Angeles, which ran from June 4 to August 1 and highlighted Los Angeles-linked artists.
What defines Lari Pittman’s painting style?
His paintings are characterized by dense, labor-intensive surfaces combining text fragments, corporate imagery, botanical motifs and ornamental patterns, often associated with magic realism and informed by social and political narratives.
Which public collections hold Pittman’s work?
Works by Pittman are held in institutions such as Long Museum in Shanghai, Jeonnam Museum of Art in Gwangyang, Orange County Museum of Art in Costa Mesa and the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York.
This article was produced with a.i. support and editorially reviewed. All statements without guarantee; auction results, exhibition dates and awards may change at short notice.
