Foundations Professor Mary Johnson to exhibit in Cleveland
Artwork by Mary Johnson, Director of Foundations in Alfred University’s School of Art and Design, will be part of a two-person exhibition, “Microcosmic Orbit, at Waterloo Arts in Cleveland, Ohio.
Johnson’s work will be alongside artist Nicole Condon-Shih, Associate Professor and Foundation Chair at the Cleveland Institute of Art.
'Microcosmic Orbit' probes the tension between the microcosmic and macrocosmic. The exhibition includes a collaborative installation that acts as a portal to catch viewers in an orbiting tension of microbe and star, video installations by Condon-Shih, drawings and photograms by Johnson.
Johnson’s landscape drawings utilize astrophotography of deep sky objects from Alfred University’s Stull Observatory, taken in collaboration with Assistant Professor of Astronomy Joshua Thomas, Director of the Stull, on the Observatory's 24-inch Planewave telescope. The drawings create an image strata in which rocks or grains of sand are indistinguishable from stars.
“Layering what we stand upon and what we view above within the same picture plane expresses the infinite/finite nature of our universe and ultimately ourselves,” Johnson writes.
The exhibit will run from April 5 to May 18.