This week we welcome Traci Johnson, an artist born and raised in Brooklyn, New York. Johnson specializes in textile design, installations, and sculpture. Johnson has shown at numerous galleries including Art Port Kingston, Sweet Lorraine Gallery, Micheal David & Co, the Museum at FIT, and the FIT Art & Design Gallery. Johnson, who uses the pronoun they, is a graduate of the Fashion Institute of Technology, where they studied fine arts and art history.
Their concepts are driven by mental health, as well as art and fashion as therapeutic subcultures. Johnson aims to create a healing space for themself and others within their work, essentially a safe space. They are deeply affected by traumas and interested in how the human mind, soul, and body can be soothed by a moment. As they discover ways to find comfort, their art emulates a calm, euphoric space. Johnson also brings themself into the painting hoping to bring a sense vibrancy within the colors of their craft.
The artist also has deep feelings about nature and the world; nature flows organically using every opportunity to grow and branch out into beautiful tendrils worldwide. Its mark is known calmly and fluidly which is an adaptation seen in their paintings. Johnson feels grateful to be able to express themselves through this outlet and will continue to display their art for the world to see.
“How do we heal from ourselves, our past, and the world? It resembles being cradled, how a baby is wrapped, and protected in the womb. How do we nurse ourselves back to comfort? It’s the infinite amount of colors and boundaryless shapes of imagination. A world without trauma is all the possibilities of what brings you joy as a child and how these sculptural shapes speak to you in the form of comfortability,” they said.
“These questions are a start to being able to think in a free way, to laugh in a free way, and to cry-a form of release from yourself. The power of imagination is gifted to us all, but due to societal pressures, we have forgotten this,” they added.. “As we return to our true selves, a metamorphosis is necessary in order to heal. As we let go of old ways we usher in a new phase of ourselves, unapologetically, we give light to our true selves. A sort of revelation into salvation.”
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