Happy Happy, Joy Joy

In artist Jacob Escobedo’s retro-infused universe at Young Blood Gallery, even mildly sinister material looks irresistibly cuddly. The Cartoon Network art director’s bunnies, squirrels and birds look like “Ren & Stimpy” characters by way of conceptual artist Takashi Murakami.

Suggesting the acid-tinged demands of Madison Avenue, whose suggestions have come to sound like barked commands, his critters’ quarters are ornamented with text. But instead of “New and Improved,” Escobedo’s paintings demand things like “Future Joy,” also the title of the exhibition, in a biting touche to the advertising industry’s currency in instant gratification.

In Escobedo’s smashup of cute and sinister, cheerful lettering and lollipop-licking tots are filtered through irony’s meat grinder. In one nursery room-worthy painting, a gaggle of adorable youngsters ride a crazy train navigated by a snaggle-toothed grim reaper. There is a similar infusion of sugary darkness in “Resist Today.” In that work, the puffy gray clouds erupting from cartoon-cute logs could be Candy Land effusions of marshmallow sweetness or toxic emissions.

A repeated motif in Escobedo’s work is the David Lynch log. The log seems to stand in for America itself, a land of clear-cut forests and kitsch, where nature becomes an amputated decorative pedestal. Escobedo has a special fondness for making his fuzzy rodents jump out of his ever-present logs like shooting range ducks or Pac-Man icons.

Often suggesting a video game, Escobedo’s paintings are a constantly erupting, shape-shifting, manic melee. Viewers may be inspired to play along, trying to pick out the visual origins in his decade-hopping puree. His diverse image bank borrows from ’50s educational films, ’60s advertisements, ’70s T-shirt graphics, “The Partridge Family,” Yellow Submarine psychedelia, pop art and 21st-century Japanimation.

Though we know better, it is hard not to fall all over again for Escobedo’s recall of the past’s chocolaty, minty, altogether yummy colors and fanciful cartoon critters.

Future Joy: New Works by Jacob Escobedo runs through May 30 at Young Blood Gallery, 629 Glenwood Ave. Thurs., 2-7 p.m.; Fri.-Sun., noon-5 p.m. 404-627-0393. www.youngbloodgallery.com.