“La Bruja” by Aliza Nisenbaum will be part of the “Altanera, Preciosa y Orgullosa” exhibition. (photo by Jason Mandella)

Regen Projects will present “Altanera, Preciosa y Orgullosa,” New York-based artist Aliza Nisenbaum’s first exhibition with the gallery in Los Angeles. The exhibition will feature a new body of work depicting dance troupes, studios and teachers local to Southern California, including Teresita de Jesús of Studio 10, Folklorico Revolución, Mariachi Tierra Mia and Amelia Muñoz Dancers. Informed by her origins in Mexico and prior work with immigrant and diasporic communities, Nisenbaum’s lively compositions exemplify the artist’s dedication to fostering connection and community in the space of painting. On Saturday, Sept. 21, at 5 p.m., Amelia Muñoz Dancers will activate Nisenbaum’s presentation with a public dance lesson.

An early, leading figure in the centrality of representation and portraiture in the preceding decade, Nisenbaum develops vibrant, figurative paintings through a form of participatory observation. She forges relationships with her subjects and connects meaningfully to the complex communities they create together. Informed by a diverse array of artistic and political traditions, Nisenbaum’s pictures (and the process through which they are made) recall forebears such as Alice Neel, Sylvia Sleigh and Diego Rivera.

From mariachi to salsa, the works give painterly shape to the fleeting festivity of these traditions. Exploring connections between sight and sound, they evoke music and movement in an otherwise static, silent medium by way of color, contour and pattern. As such, they recall modernist experiments and visionaries such as Sonia Delaunay and Florine Stettheimer. Mindful of the ever-intensifying specter of technology that shapes our daily lives and recalling sociologist Émile Durkheim’s theory of “collective effervescence,” Nisenbaum’s paintings celebrate these spaces and occasions for dancing as consecrated moments apart from our screens and devices, reminding us of the pleasure of being more fully of and with our bodies and each other.

The exhibit is on display through Oct. 26. The gallery is open Tuesday-Saturday 10 a.m.-6 p.m. For information on this and and the public dance lesson, visit regenprojects.com. Regen Projects is located at 6750 Santa Monica Blvd.