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For decades the look of most Los Angeles photographs has been either aggressively experimental or purposefully, humorously numskull. But a few artists have clung to the tradition of the well-crafted photographic print, even as they participated in the conceptual revolution centered in the region. John Divola is one of these.

Divola’s first important work was his Vandalism Series, in which straightforward, forensic photographs describe a manipulated scene. He counters the derelict, found situation with simple formal gestures-graffiti tags claiming new turf. Later work (the Zuma Series of the late 1970s) more skillfully combined color and the landscape viewed through doorways and windows of abandoned buildings. This and more recent efforts have rightfully brought Divola an international reputation, but nothing has surpassed the Vandalism Series for economy of means and purity of idea.