ART / SNEAK PEEK : FOR LOCAL ARTIST, EVERYTHING NEW IS OLD AGAIN.

Years from now, when space aliens go rummaging through the late, great city of Los Angeles, they may uncover peeled poster fragments, obscure graphic designs and other visual flotsam from the lost metropolis.

The rest of us won't have to wait that long, thanks to artist Guillermo Bert.

Casting himself as a kind of artist-cum-archeologist, Bert uses modern urban iconography to suggest how our present society may look from the vantage point of the not-too-distant future.

In a new series titled ``Off the Wall,'' showing at L.A.'s Artissimo Gallery, Bert combines poster scraps, digital images, painting and other media to create multilayered assemblages of futuristic decay. Chipped and fragmented, they resemble what you'd expect to find on the facades of derelict downtown buildings: tattered, faded collages of partial information and absentee meaning, haunted by the ghosts of their former selves.

Part of a series called ``L.A. Sites,'' ``Off the Wall'' makes particular use of poster fragments adorned with images of dancers and athletes. Seen in this artificially aged condition, the athletes' bodies echo the series' preoccupation with fleeting beauty and here-today, gone-tomorrow significance.

``I'm trying to produce instant vestiges,'' says Bert.

``There are always pieces that are missing. That's the way I perceive American society, in the sense of the overload of information and the impossibility of getting the whole picture. It also has to do with the disposability of our culture.''

A native of Chile and an L.A. resident for the past 15 years, Bert, 39, keeps a studio in the downtown Brewery complex but lives in Van Nuys. If you read Spanish, chances are you've seen his graphic artwork in the Spanish-language newspaper La Opinion.

Though Bert says the show's themes apply to any large city, he believes they're particularly fitting for the pop-culture capital of America.

``In Los Angeles, with the movie industry, it seems like the pop icons, they are so ephemeral. They last a few weeks sometimes, and then they're gone.''

Recently extended through Dec. 5, the show can be viewed between noon and 5:30 p.m. Tuesday through Friday, noon and 4 p.m. Saturday. The gallery is located at 7378 Beverly Blvd. at Martel Avenue, between Fairfax and La Brea avenues. Admission is free. For information, call [phone].

Hammering Armand: Looks like we're in for another round of challenges to Armand Hammer's carefully cultivated reputation as a benevolent friend of the arts.

In ``Dossier: The Secret History of Armand Hammer,'' published last month by Random House, author Edward Jay Epstein asserts that the billionaire California oilman exploited his position as a trustee of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art to scoop up a stash of Honore Daumier drawings for his own personal collection, after he'd promised to donate them to the museum.

According to a recent write-up in The New York Times, the book (recently excerpted in the New Yorker) also alleges that Hammer deliberately overvalued artworks that he donated to charity, thus entitling himself to bigger tax write-offs.

Clothes to dye for: Though little-known to Westerners, the ancient art of batik has thrived for centuries on the Indonesian island of Java. An intricate dyeing technique, batik serves the islanders not simply as decoration, but as a means of conveying visual messages about social status, power and ethnic identity.

Through Jan. 26, an exhibition at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art traces the evolution of this vibrantly colored cloth over the past century. ``Fabric of Enchantment: Batik from the North Coast of Java From the Inger McCabe Elliott Collection'' is open during regular museum hours: 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Thursday; 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Friday; 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. Admission is $6 adults; $4 students 18 and older with ID and seniors 62 and older; $1 children; free to children 5 and under. The second Wednesday of every month is free to all. Call [phone].

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Photo: Artist Guillermo Bert's ``Two Dancers,'' part of the ``Off the Wall'' exhibit, is designed to look like a timeworn object found in the future.