Johnson could easily, perhaps, make a living out of such bucolic scenes but he has also tackled the more complex subject matter of cityscapes. In Pine and Grant (2019-21), the artist has started out depicting, in a realistic manner, a very specific location in San Francisco. It is probably possible to identify the various buildings, because of their architectural features. But this realism is obscured by large square, rectangle and oblong shapes of secondary colors superimposed upon the city backdrop. It is a conscious effort on the artist s part to merge aspects of representation and abstraction in one canvas. This may not be everyone s notion of a San Francisco city scene.
Johnson could easily, perhaps, make a living out of such bucolic scenes but he has also tackled the more complex subject matter of cityscapes. In Pine and Grant (2019-21), the artist has started out depicting, in a realistic manner, a very specific location in San Francisco. It is probably possible to identify the various buildings, because of their architectural features. But this realism is obscured by large square, rectangle and oblong shapes of secondary colors superimposed upon the city backdrop. It is a conscious effort on the artist s part to merge aspects of representation and abstraction in one canvas. This may not be everyone s notion of a San Francisco city scene.