Bruce Nauman

In South America Circle , one of Nauman's minimalist sculptures depicted here, a chair dangles from the ceiling of a bare room, perched within an enormous, suspended metallic hoop. An Indiana-born artist who soaked up Dada and conceptualism in California, Nauman preserved a sense of humor, most evident in neon-tube pieces as ribald and cartoonish as their titles ( Sex and Death by Murder and Suicide ; Mean Clown Welcome ). Yet he is serious too: even the neon contraptions touch raw nerves in their exploration of our addiction to violence. Curiously graceful fiberglass pieces evoke coiling vines, seed pods or fragmented industrial machinery. Then there are the tunnels, slabs engraved with words, performance pieces and video installations, all thoughtfully, if humorlessly, analyzed by van Bruggen, a contributor to Artforum. One-third of the 326 plates are in color. (Mar.)