Jo Johnston
visual artist
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Jo Johnston (geb. 1972) lebt mit ihre jüngste (von drei) Tochter in Pankow, Berlin. Ursprünglich stammt sie aus Derbyshire, England. Sie zog 2007 nach Berlin.
1992 studierte sie zwei Jahre am College of Art in Birmingham, bevor sie eine Ausbildung zur Ergotherapeutin begann und in diesem Beruf arbeitete. Neben diesem Broterwerb professionalisierte sie ihre künstlerische Arbeit und stellte regelmäßig ihre Malereien und Zeichnungen aus.
Jo Johnston hat sich über die Jahre hinweg mit der menschlichen Figur beschäftigt, die Themenschwerpunkt in ihren aktuellen grafischen sehr gefühlsorientierten Arbeiten ist. |
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Jo Johnston (born 1972) comes originally from England, and in 2007 she moved to Berlin. In 1992 she spent 2 years studying at Birmingham College of Art.
After moving to Berlin, she began to do small scale ink drawings mainly of Berlin street scenes. These were her way of exploring, and getting to know the city. She played around with some of these images in different scales and medium, which eventually led to large scale oil paintings of bicycles seen around Berlin. They are deliberately kept loose and playful, in contrast to the ink drawings. “The variety of bikes in Berlin is so that they almost seem to have personalities of their own! The patterns made by bikes and their shadows make for dynamic and cheerful paintings”.
Jo has done a lot of life drawing over the years, and has recently returned to drawing the figure in a new and ongoing series. These explore moods and feelings of a more personal nature. Human nature, all the phases of life with its wide range of emotions and energy and how we interact with one another interests Jo.
The ongoing series called “More Light” explores the connection between people, light and darkness. Jo uses Indian Inks on watercolour paper layered to emphasize the contrast between dark and light. She attempts to capture the elusive energy that our emotions give out, those that cannot be described but can be felt. Working on a more positive aspect of life is the series “Songs of Innocence” examining the energy surrounding children and teenagers at play, and their absolute absorption in activities. The series “In Free Fall” looks at the drama and intensity of emotions in a relationship that is not going well.
Alongside this work, Jo has a joint project with Marcel Kröner called ”The Little Window Galerie”. Allegedly the smallest art gallery in Berlin, where each month one piece work from different artists is exhibited in our “Schaufenster”. The little window is on the busy Berliner Strasse in Pankow for everyone to enjoy. We don’t make any money, preferring that the artworks are free for all to enjoy.