HOLLYWOOD

A dry little group of paintings depicting desert life acts as a preface of Lisa Ferrante’s journey into Southwestern Indian folk art and her own Catholic roots. Initially appearing as a skeptical realist, she paints a trailer, a pickup truck, herself at target practice, all in the bleak surroundings of a parched landscape that’s vaguely infused with overtones of violence and death. We’re told that these autobiographical works recount a period of living on a Navajo reservation (where her mother was an English teacher) and a move to her current home in Taos, N. M. Quite a change for the UC Davis graduate who hasn’t had a solo show here in five years, when she was making big, dark paintings heavy with doom.

The introduction sets us up for a brooding, Hopper-esque tour of the Southwest, but what transpires is a fantastic encounter with folk art and Catholic imagery that has more in common with Mexican artist Frida Kahlo than the American realist. Leaving her painted resume in the dust, Ferrante shoots off into the religiously charged space of tortured saints, crucifixes, flagellation and stigmata. Flesh and bones are often torn apart as she paints Christ and St. Sebastian as skeletons or superimposes hearts and entrails on other forms. Blood pours out of wounds so copiously in one work that an angel flies by to catch it in a cup.

Painting with a vivid palette in oil on canvas or watercolor on paper, Ferrante makes highly emotional art that’s all of a piece. Usually continuing images or background patterns on shadow box frames, she sometimes switches from paint to cut-out bits of metal nailed to the frame or red toothpicks that protrude like porcupine quills. In doing so, she adapts the intense flavor of religious folk art to her own style which segues from relatively simple and primitive to intricately patterned and well modeled forms.

There’s so much going on in the show that’s easy to pass it all off as a young woman’s attempt to sort herself out. But the art is too captivating to let it go at that. Ferrante is clearly on to something that has an edge of authenticity and a spirit new to her work. Though the gaiety is only a matter of color and pattern, it provides an effective foil to horrific subject matter. Ferrante gives us the charm of religious dogma as she twists its knife. (Newspace, 5241 Melrose Ave., to Aug. 1).