Los Angeles-based painter Seth Armstrong creates paintings that seize time, near-cinematic moments of suspended or implied action. Some offer vast views, and others contracted intimacy, moving freely in and out of public and private spaces to create ambiguous vantage points. Known for paintings that self-consciously capture the act of looking – whether as a voyeur in trespass or a participant in the landscape – Armstrong captures the simultaneity of the city as a place of endless, contingent narratives, jarring interruptions, and suspenseful pauses.

In Lil’ Baja’s Last Ride, Armstrong combines his patented interest in the grittier recesses of urban life with his penchant for humor and a good inside joke, dedicating the exhibition’s title to his recently retired car, the unsuspecting casualty of a freak fire in the MOAH’s parking lot.