The John Baldessari retrospective “Pure Beauty” at the Met formerly at Tate Modern and LACMA features more than 120 pieces spanning the Californian artist’s career of nearly half a century. Walking into the galleries, one of the first things you encounter is The Backs of All the Trucks Passed While Driving from Los Angeles to Santa Barbara, California, Sunday, 20 January 1963 – a grid of photos Baldessari took when driving on the highway. The process sounds almost like a road trip game: take a picture every time you pass a truck. There’s nothing about aesthetics here, but the concept and disciplined structure of the exercise. It reminds me of Ed Ruscha’s Every Building on the Sunset Strip 1966, only this Baldessari piece was three years earlier.