The Art of the Schizophrenic : Exhibit: A gallery will display works from mental health clinic patients that range from realistic to abstract.

Donald has spent most of his adult life in mental institutions, tortured since his late teens by voices that said: “People are talking about you. People are laughing at you.” Sometimes the voices warned Donald that he was going to be hurt or killed.

Admitted to the Anne Sippi Clinic for the Treatment of Schizophrenia last year, the former Tarzana resident spent most of the time between therapy sessions in his room, nervously smoking cigarettes.

Then, clinic psychotherapists coaxed Donald, 47, into taking an art class.

Now, Donald can claim the title “artist” and look forward to being honored at a reception Sunday afternoon at an Encino art gallery where his paintings are hanging alongside those of other clinic patients.

Titled “Journey From Chaos,” the two-week exhibit at Installations One features acrylics, charcoals and watercolors by 18 of the El Sereno clinic’s 40 patients. All have a long-term history of schizophrenia, a thought disorder characterized by auditory hallucinations, delusional or paranoid thoughts and withdrawal from society.

But you wouldn’t necessarily know that from looking at their art.

“You could see this work in any gallery and it would definitely hold up. It’s of good quality,” said Mickey Kaplan, founder and director of LAART, a nonprofit artists’ association that operates the gallery where the paintings will be on display through Jan. 19. “Some of the artists exhibiting could put their work in a regular contemporary art show and nobody would know the difference.”

The show was curated by the clinic’s treatment director, Chess Brodnick, an artist and psychotherapist whose work is sometimes displayed at the gallery. The show came about after Brodnick off-handedly remarked to Kaplan that many of his patients were doing extremely creative work in the art classes held at the clinic three times a week.

Told that their artwork would be displayed at the gallery, many of the clinic’s patients eagerly set out to create work for the show.

“They got really excited about it because it wasn’t just painting pictures for the cafeteria wall. They knew they were going to put these pictures in a professional art gallery and sell them,” Brodnick said.

“Some of these patients have 20-year histories of mental illness. It’s a level of success that they could only have dreamed of. So many times, my patients are frightened of taking a chance. They have been made to feel that they are failures, that they’ll never be successes. Just knowing that this was going into the gallery, they have already felt the success. If it sells, that’s more success. I think everybody will be changed by it.”

Invitations were sent to about 500 people, including families and friends of the patients, psychiatrists, art collectors and other galleries.

The acts of painting and drawing had therapeutic results, Brodnick said.

“Just imagine you’re being assailed by voices that are telling you the devil is going to destroy you--you fear for your life because of these voices--but you go to a class and put yourself into that painting,” Brodnick explained. “Pretty soon, you are concentrating on painting and you aren’t thinking about the voices anymore.”

Patients, only one of whom had formal art training, were allowed to create whatever they wanted and to choose which works would be displayed. The paintings range from realistic to abstract and are priced from $25 to $100--much lower than those usually on display at the gallery. Brodnick insisted that a 20% commission go to the gallery. The artists will keep the rest.

Many of the paintings are primitive and childlike. Some have religious symbolism, others are preoccupied with violent themes. Jack, 19, painted a cross, an ax dripping blood and the skeletal face of a one-eyed man. He called it “Autopsy,” the name of a heavy-metal band he said inspired the imagery, Brodnick said.

Encouraged to try abstract art, Donald created his own art technique and dubbed it “shmooshism.” He painted a canvas bright red, then dabbed other colors on wax paper before smearing them onto the canvas with his hands.

Anne Sippe, whose mother helped found the clinic that bears her name, was discovered to be autistic as a baby. Also diagnosed as schizophrenic, she was expelled as a teen-ager from special private schools after hitting and biting classmates and was sent to a private mental hospital where she spent most of her time in restraints to prevent her from pulling out her hair and scratching her arms raw.

Now 41 years old and pursuing her high school diploma, Sippe painted for the show childlike images of a bee and a dog.

Ilana, a former actress who believes she has magical powers and that aliens are planning to take over the earth, at first balked at participating in the show. But then she poured bright primary colors across a canvas and said it represented a positive life force, Brodnick said. Later, Ilana asked for red and yellow paint, announced that she was going to paint “anger” and flung the paint at the canvas as hard as she could.

Some patients’ artwork reflected their delusions, but Brodnick said he was surprised to see that most of the patients “tapped into more positive parts of themselves.”

“The interesting thing about it is it’s really an upbeat show,” he said. “I was expecting to see a lot of very angst-ridden paintings. I was very surprised at the happy things that were coming out: bright colors, expressive happy faces. There’s a lot of energy and exuberance in their work.”

“Journey From Chaos” will be on display at Installations One, 15821 Ventura Blvd., from 11:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays through Jan. 19. For information, call (818) 981-9422.