For her second solo show at ZieherSmith, Detroit-based artist Louise Jones has painted a series of thoughtful and occasionally hilarious musings on family traditions and communal rituals. Jones is a second-generation Chinese American who was raised in California, where she clearly picked up multiple cultural influences. Her paintings are often composed like photographs — you can almost see the bright flash working in “Another Crab Dinner,” like a painterly Richard Billingham tableau. A painting like “Seniors” shows off all her strengths — a precisely painted oak tree, perfectly framed against a clear blue sky, is disrupted by ribbons of toilet paper hanging from its branches. The ritual of American high school seniors trashing their teachers’ yards is treated with the same careful attention as a retailer’s wall of cellphone cases (“In This Immense Confusion One Thing Alone Is Clear”), or a pond full of flowering lilypads (“Water Lilies of Fox Creek”). It’s absurd and evocative, and more than worth a visit to the bright Edgehill gallery.
Through April 4 at ZieherSmith
1207 South St.
