Christmas isn’t done yet

Even though the biggest holiday of the year is over, the Artisan Gallery exhibit about it runs until January 7, at 1901 Del Paso Boulevard. But This Side of Christmas II has nothing to do with tinsel, trees and holly. Lisa Magruder’s black-and-white collograph prints may be named after the first five books of the Bible, but the abstracts offer an intriguing play of positive and negative spaces filled with texture and smoothness, as in “Exodus.”

Raymond Kruger’s “The Playground” pulls you in with the impressionistic nuances emanating from his simple but very curious playground scenario. In a light—almost white—atmosphere highly charged with brushstrokes, naked young boys wildly prance in a circle, obviously taunting another of their peers, who’s trapped in the middle. But he’s clothed, and the look on his face takes this piece far beyond The Emperor’s New Clothes. For more information, call (916) 648-0260.