Artists Interview Artists: Barbara Johnson-Gresser

Barbara Johnson-Gresser, a Washington, D.C. based artist, participates in the Artists Interview Artists Project. Below Barbara responds to another artist's five questions (Martin Henry from New Bern, NC). In order to participate, Barbara had to provide me with five questions for some other artist to answer. The assigning of questions to artists is completely random. If you're an artist and interested in participating, let me know.

grand central station #2
oil on wood panel
12" x 12"
2005

1.How do you see the distinctions between an artist, a craftsperson and a designer?

intention. i believe each of these creators do so with very different intentions. artists most often steer clear of functional work and focus more on aesthetics, concepts, and making work that adds to the visual dialogue of the culture (in general). craftspeople are certainly aesthetically oriented but include the element of function in their intention. and designers, i believe, include the element or function of communication in their creative processes.

2. What is your relationship with one of your past projects that you have made and later been sold?

i sold a painting to a woman who was my doctor at the time. it was nice. she hung the work in her office and when i visited i got to see it. after some time, i stopped going to her because her staff changed and the new people were inept and they screwed up appointments and billing with no end in sight. we had also become friends and had been going to a buddhist center together. i found out the group was against the dalai lama and i left it because i am very much a student of the dalai lama. she stayed and became a senior teacher with the group. i wonder if she still has that painting. it was based on a microscopic image of sperm impregnating an egg which was really an image from a satellite photograph of a lake in china. i still have slides of it. like so much of my work, i let go of it after i made it. it's like we had our relationship - it was the act of painting. what is left is a relic of that relationship. some of them are more than relics and are really my teachers. those i can never let go. the suite of 9 paintings i did over the past year will be very difficult for me to sell. i am still learning so much from each of them.

3. What is your impression of Jackson Pollock?

i still think he copied lee krasner. i think he was a macho crazy alcoholic who got in touch with a very primal aspect of painting and i'm grateful for that. my own work owes alot to his discoveries and it was through a very physical painting technique that i developed my own style, though it hardly looks that way. once i was teaching(?) 4 year olds in a painting class. one little girl just sat on the floor and moved paint around forever. it became a big black blob. the visual image was not of any interest to her. it was the action of painting that fulfilled her. pollock put us in touch with that basic aspect/potential of artmaking.

4. What is one insight of being an artist that those who do not practice may not be aware of?

back in the 80s i stopped painting for 3 years. i worked in an art supply store and the last thing i wanted to see at night was more tubes of paint. i had the urge to price them, inventory them, face them neatly on my shelves. but not to open them and paint. then i got fired. the company went bankrupt and slashed middle management throughout the country. i spent a month in a coffee shop smoking and writing in my journal and then i began to paint again. within a few months i was teaching again. one night on my way home from teaching i looked out the window of my car and noticed the moon. it was stunning. it was like i'd never seen it before. and i began to weep. my vision had returned. i vowed that night that i would never again stop looking at the world through a painter's eyes.

5. Do you have secret formulas or techniques that you keep to yourself and refuse to share with other artists?

no. i'm a teacher as well as an artist and one of the things that guides my teaching style is the way i was taught back in the 70's and 80's. which is to say that there was very little technical training. no one ever said, "this will do that" or "try using this tool instead of that one". it was the time of extreme artistic freedom. in critiques we talked and talked about what worked and what didn't. but showing the students techniques to accomplish something that worked was pretty much forbidden. now i show my students different ways they can use their materials. i got all my technical and materials training from sales reps from the major art materials manufacturers. it was actually a great education....when i consider the combination of the two approaches.

grand central station #3
oil on wood panel
12" x 12"
2005

Previous Interviews:
Juno Doran (questions by James W. Bailey)
Josh Feldman (questions by Joseph Barbaccia)
Lisa Stephenson (questions by Whitney Lynn)
Joseph Barbaccia (questions by Josh Feldman)
James W. Bailey (questions by Matt Hollis)
Matt Hollis (questions by Juno Doran)
Carol Es (questions by James Leonard)
Alexandra Silverthorne (questions by Ami Lahoff)
Christine Buckton Tillman (questions by Carol Es)
Douglas Witmer (questions by Alexandra Silverthorne)
Sky Pape (questions by Douglas Witmer)
Whitney Lynn (questions by Lisa Stephenson)
Heather Levy (questions by Joanne Greenbaum)
Heather Lowe (questions by Samantha Wolov)
Samantha Wolov (questions by Heather Levy)
Timothy McClellan (questions by Heather Lowe)
James Leonard (questions by Sky Pape)
Joanne Greenbaum (questions by Timothy McClellan)
Richard Kooyman (questions by Robert Walton)
Candy Keegan (questions by Warren Craghead)
Robert Walton (questions by Candy Keegan)
John M. Adams (questions by Richard Kooyman)
Prescott Moore Lassman (questions by Mary Addison Hackett)
Mary Addison Hackett (questions by Prescott Moore Lassman)
Andrew Wodzianski (questions by Nathan Manuel & D.Billy)
Nathan Manuel & D.Billy (questions by Andrew Wodzianski)
Michael Janis (questions by Scott Listfield)
Scott Listfield (questions by Michael Janis)
F. Lennox Campello (questions by Sean Hennessy)
Matt Andrade (questions by Adrian Parsons)
Sean Hennessy (questions by F. Lennox Campello)
George Wayne (questions by Michelle McAuliffe)
Eridanus Sellen (questions by Anabela Jevtovic)
Anabela Jevtovic (questions by Eridanus Sellen)
Marianela de la Hoz (questions by A.B. Miner)
Martin Henry (questions by Barbara Johnson-Gresser)
A.B. Miner (questions by George Wayne)

Comments

[Matt]

Cool site, I'm a signage photographer.

[Colleen Wainwright]

What a fascinating and inspiring interview. Useful, too. I think I finally have 5-second rap on what it is I do as a designer.