In his newest exhibition, “As Not Seen” at the Center for Arts and Learning in Montpelier, James Secor explores a phenomenon in the built landscape that most of us probably give scant attention: storage units. Working in acrylics, the Vermont artist presents paintings about objects that “fall away as noise,” as he puts it. Secor admires the geometry and repetition in rows of storage units, which speak to excess and possibly hoarding. He even allows evanescent shadows their own planes of brilliant color, as much a part of the scene as the pitched-roof units. Perhaps only in paintings — that is, in an artist’s eye — do these caches of consumerism convey “a formal, minimalist beauty,” as Secor would have it. Pictured: “Units M-Q (Mickey D’s).”