Catholic Conceptions

Say what you will about Catholicism--it still makes for great art.

Case in point: the latest exhibition at the Dazibao gallery, Monique Bertrand's Un Fait de Peinture. Bertrand's works are enormous photographic installations with darkly religious overtones. For example, "Crooked Cross" features a giant fish hanging from a meat hook, while "Monstres/Saints" includes early 20th century photographs of deformed clinical subjects.

Bertrand's installations are infinitely more layered than simple description allows, on both a technical and conceptual level. Her handling of materials--in this case, steel, plexiglass, copper and neon lights--is masterful. Each piece is a coherent conceptual unit, with the material supports saying as much as the photographs on which they are mounted. In short, Bertrand constructs living, breathing, sorrowful poetry, enrapturing you in her beautiful nightmare. : -- Sholem Krishtalka

At 4001 Berri, until April 16.

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