(2023) This Magic Moment
An exploration of materials that capture and celebrate the ephemeral.
(2023) Terrain Biennial
"Like the intentional pause in a musical score, there is a break from the daily noise of my busy life: a sunset walk around the neighborhood with my spouse and dog. Life gets quiet. The sky is changing. The clouds are magical. This gift is a reminder to be present, calm, and in awe of life. A brief but welcome rest before the tempo picks back up. As you ponder this year’s Terrain theme: “Mycelium Connection,” a thriving interconnected ecosystem - ask yourself: How can connecting with nature provide respite in your days and help you thrive?" - show statement
Terrain Exhibitions brings contemporary art where it is most needed and least expected: yards, front steps, windowsills, porches, and rooftops in neighborhoods worldwide. This is an act of radical decentralization, taking art from privileged urban centers and bringing it into everyday spaces. By forging partnerships between artists and citizens, we create greater access for new and underserved audiences for contemporary art, empowering neighbors to make private spaces public in a spirit of generosity and collaboration.
(2023) Tangled
Hanging ceramic sculptures that contemplate navigating life.
(2022) Making Our History: Artists Render Lincoln's Legacy, University of Illinois, Springfield
Lindsay Johnson’s three sculptures of children highlight how the Civil War transformed their lives. In one, Lincoln jauntily carries his son on his shoulders, symbolizing his playful joy in parenthood and the importance of loving bonds between parent and child. In another, a heartbroken girl clutches the Union army cap of her dead father. She evokes the wartime sundering of parental bonds in countless families North and South. In the last, an older boy protectively holds his younger sister as she stares warily into the distance. The children are freed slaves, possibly parentless. What awaited them? Emancipation opened vistas beyond the plantation, but also profound uncertainties. The gift of freedom was the burden of independence: like all other children of the Civil War, black children would walk into an unknown future and find their way." - excerpt from Professor Graham A. Peck's historical essay Children of War
(2021) Deep Waters
In a complex year checkered with grief and trauma, rest and resilience, we somehow learned to swim right before we began to drown. Parenthood especially felt harder than ever as we navigated working from home, school at home, and our own physical and mental well-being during a time of narrowing options. Amidst harrowing health scares and racial trauma, parents determined what to share with their children, what to shield them from, and how to preserve moments of joy.
Artist mother and educator, Lindsay Johnson constructed these narrative works on panels with acrylic, photographs, or found material to reconstruct moments in time, ideas, and dreams during the Covid-19 pandemic. The blue used throughout many of these works are made from disposable surgical masks, placed as sky, to emphasize the invisible yet inescapable force that both pulled us apart and under, and propelled us forward and together." - show statement, Side Street Studio Arts, 2021