HAVERHILL — When we think about great artists and where they came from, Italy comes to mind.

Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo were among the great Italian artists. Indeed, when da Vinci's "Mona Lisa" was exhibited in New York and Washington, D.C., during the winter of 1962 and Michelangelo's "Pieta" was brought to the New York World's Fair in 1964, thousands of Americans flocked to view those great works of art.

But this time it worked out in reverse, with an American painter being invited to display her work in Italy.

Lisa Marie Esposito, a 1976 Haverhill High graduate, was asked to show four of her paintings at a major exhibition that recently took place in Ferrara, Italy. She has a doctorate in philosophy and now heads the department of philosophy and religion at Drury University in Springfield, Mo.

While she always liked to paint and benefited from art classes at Haverhill High, Esposito is largely self-taught. She picked up the brush in earnest a few years ago and has already sold several of her works for hundreds of dollars each, said her father, Francis Esposito of Haverhill.

"We're very proud of her," said the elder Esposito, an engineer who is retired from Raytheon.

His wife, Alba, formerly worked at Haverhill City Hall. They live on Park Street.

Lisa Esposito was invited to show four of her abstract paintings in the Imaginary Journeys International Art Exhibition at the Estense Castle in Ferrara. She did not volunteer her work for the show. Rather, the artistic committee of the exhibition extended the invitation after viewing her work on her Web site — www.lisaesposito.com.

"We've been fascinated by your vibrant and powerful abstract art research where forms and colors create such intense and emotional results," the invitation reads.

"All my work is self-portraits," Esposito explained to The Eagle-Tribune in a telephone interview shortly after she returned from the exhibition, which took place from Oct. 24 to Nov. 1. Her paintings show a variety of emotions, she said.

One of Esposito's paintings displayed at the exhibit is titled "Quiet Desperation," based on great writer Henry David Thoreau's observation in "Walden" that "the mass of men live lives of quiet desperation."

The art work features a swirl of colors, on a red background, that could be seen as a wave, a whirlpool, a distant galaxy viewed through a telescope, or even a tornado.

"I want the viewer to look at the image" and take what he or she can from it, Lisa Esposito said.

Another painting, "Triumphant," shows a flash of yellow, with streaks of green, blue and purple, that seems to emerge from a red sky or sea.

Esposito's parents said she has always been drawn to philosophy. She said philosophy deals with "the fundamental questions of life." Asking such questions as "Why am I here? What is my purpose in life?" is the basis of philosophy, she said.

After graduating from Haverhill High, Esposito attended Wheaton College, where she designed her own major, medieval studies.

She earned her doctorate in medieval philosophy at the University of Toronto.

That led to her teaching philosophy, which she did at the University of Toronto, the Catholic University of Louvain in Belgium, the University of New Hampshire and Merrimack College, before being hired by Drury.

Given her interest in medieval history and philosophy, she enjoyed the costumes worn by people at the Estense Castle, the troubadours who greeted artists and spectators, and the procession that marked the start of the exhibition.

"It was very exciting," she said.

Asked which Haverhill teachers influenced her the most, Esposito gave high marks to Margaret Masera and Susan Paradis, who taught art at Haverhill High.

She credited English teacher George Manoogian with inspiring her desire to study the medieval period. Manoogian taught Geoffrey Chaucer's "The Canterbury Tales," she said.

It was thrilling to have her work displayed with prominent artists from all over the world, Esposito said, because, "I'm such a newcomer."

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