Google Phil Solomon and you'll get “American experimental filmmaker.” Not really helpful. So how about this? Solomon works inside a recognizable cinematic format, using film and digital projection, and sometimes room-filling installations, to pursue an ambitious vision that both celebrates and dismembers what cinema promises. His unique processes include something he calls “re-photography”: Solomon mines both found and original images for nuggets he can recombine into avant-garde films that are haunting, witty and sublime. His fans are wild about him, but somehow, after 40 years of dazzlement, he's not yet a household name. Now, with a major exhibition at Young Projects Gallery opening May 16, a citywide slate of screenings and appearances including Los Angeles Filmforum events May 18 at Velaslavasay Panorama and May 19 at the Egyptian, and programs at UCLA and CalArts, that might be about to change. This crosstown juggernaut of in-persons wraps up with Monday's “Elegiac Visions of Phil Solomon” at REDCAT, which includes masterpieces from 1983 and 1999, digital works from 2002 and a more recent 2005-09 trilogy that constructs a tribute to 9/11 from the mauled bits of a popular video game. The Young Projects Gallery exhibition runs through Aug. 2 at the Pacific Design Center, functioning as this visionary's first significant career survey, with extra love for the large-scale installations Solomon engineers based on his reel. (See our interview with Solomon in the Film section.) REDCAT, 631 W. Second St., dwntwn.; Mon., May 20, 8:30 p.m.; $10. (213) 237-2800, redcat.org.

Mon., May 20, 8:30 p.m., 2013

Advertising disclosure: We may receive compensation for some of the links in our stories. Thank you for supporting LA Weekly and our advertisers.