East Wind A'Blowin'

And given how barbarically the creatures destined for our tables are often treated in American factory farms, the work is also a rebuke to Western culture, as becomes clear from the accompanying text detailing a procedure designed to be more humane. The animal's eyes and ears are first checked to ensure that it's healthy, and the animal is given a drink of water to satisfy its thirst and to calm it. A prayer is recited. Finally, one cut of an unserrated blade severs the esophagus, trachea, and major arteries in the neck. The photos remain unsettling, but at least they chronicle a process intended to retain a measure of the animal's dignity and to minimize its suffering.

"Exploding the Lotus" made me suspicious when I noticed that the name of co-curator Jaishri Abichandani was attached to three works. There's always the possibility of an overinflated ego. But after a second pass through the galleries, I became convinced that Abichandani's participation is far from arbitrary — indeed, hers are among the show's most provocative pieces.

The curator-artist's two-and-a-half-minute video Bijli: Heart of a Drag Queen (2006) is hard not to notice. Its wailing soundtrack hits you as soon as you enter the main gallery, and the simple imagery — a fully made-up drag queen performing — is projected onto the curving wall at the far end of the gallery. The text describes Bijli's treatment at the hands of a culture not known to be sympathetic to gender bending.

A second Abichandani video, Happily Never After (2005), runs two minutes and 12 seconds and is shown on a tiny DVD player. It's a drily funny little vignette in which a fortune-telling robot delivers seven possible scenarios, none of which is especially appealing.

Abichandani's most satisfying work here is one that deftly conflates the traditional with the modern, the secular with the religious. Untitled Camera Sculptures (2003-06) presents a quartet of mixed-media works, each an ordinary camera rendered extraordinary by the application of dozens and dozens of tiny fake gemstones. Abichandani has also gutted the cameras and replaced their innards with tiny figures — including, for instance, a Buddha's head — that transform them into something like miniature makeshift altars. Unlike so much of "Exploding the Lotus," these unassuming little sculptures are heady without playing head games.