There’s a whole lot going on in Aaron Johnson’s
paintings. They’re visually rich with vibrant colors, densely packed
compositions and a profoundly macabre subject matter. Generously larded with
potent political and societal themes, the work is created through a complicated
technique Aaron refers to as “reverse painted acrylic polymer peel painting.”
In the multi-step process, Aaron starts with a
preliminary drawing. “For the small paintings with their hyper detail it helps
for me to plan it all out in advance,” he says. “Narratives come easily when
I’m drawing with pencil and paper—letting things come into my mind and having
fun with it.” The drawings get messy with all the erasing and smudges of
graphite and so he makes a tracing of them that he tapes to the front of the
polyethylene plastic sheeting on stretchers he uses as his painting surface.
“For the bigger ones, I’ll just draw right onto the plastic because it’s a
looser piece.”
Aaron’s paintings have three layers of paint each
separated by a layer of acrylic polymer. The acrylic polymer is a clear plastic
in liquid form, that’s poured onto the finished layer of paint and left
overnight to harden. The layering adds a wonderful sense of rhythm and
dimensionality to Aaron’s work.
Painting backwards, Aaron must first put down the
detail. Disembodied from the rest of the components making up the form, these
floating elements (teeth, eyes, nails, etc.) don’t make much sense to anyone at
this point other than the artist. This layer is followed by the under coat of
color which completes the figures, and finally the background layer is applied.
To grasp how hard this is, you have to understand that from the working side,
it’s impossible to tell what the painting looks like, it has to be turned
around in order to see its true appearance. So, as he's working, Aaron is
constantly thinking ahead to what’s going to happen in the next layers.
“The way I paint is the reverse of how most
painters work,” Aaron explains. “They start with broad strokes and start to
find forms and then refine and approach details. I start with detail and zoom
out. It’s like the details are super precise and controlled and I know what I’m
going for. In the beginning, I’m using a tiny brush; it’s painstakingly slow
and then as the paintings progress, I’m relinquishing control of this thing I
labored on. The backgrounds often involve splatters and poured paint—chance
things and a little bit of chaos so I’m not exactly quite sure what the
finished work is going to look like from the front anymore.”
After all the paint and acrylic polymer is layered
onto the plastic, Aaron transfers the work onto stretched netting. This is done
by laying the plastic painting surface flat, plastic side down, and
pouring a final coat of polymer and then applying the netting. The polymer saturates
the net, congealing all those layers of paint to the net as the polymer dries. When it's dry, the plastic is peeled away.
Aaron began using netting because when he used
this multi-layered technique on canvas, it wasn’t porous enough and so he ended
up with a lot of air bubbles, He got the idea to use the unconventional
material walking past a construction site in New York where he spotted the
orange net barricades. Eventually, he found a company in Connecticut that
manufactures every kind of netting you could find. Aaron even did a commission
for them using all the different kinds of netting they produce. They now send
him barrels full of remnants.
Aaron’s characters are inspired by Mexican Day of
the Dead figures. There’s plenty of blood and grossness in his work, but it’s
handled in such an irreverent and intentionally outlandish way, it comes across
as darkly funny rather than truly disturbing. In one, a bizarre
feast/operation is depicted. It’s a grotesque comedy featuring a cast of
oddball death’s headed characters arranged around a table including a nurse who
has cut into the body releasing a toaster with toast flying out and hitting her
on the face.
Aaron’s mother grew up in Assam and his childhood
house was filled with Indian art. He says the Indian aesthetic is so ingrained
in his self-conscious he references it without thinking about it. This explains
the ease with which he incorporates the sumptuous palette, marvelously
inventive patterns and flame-like gestures that recall Indian miniatures and enliven
his paintings. In some works, Aaron makes more direct reference: inserting the
elephant foot stool he inherited from his grandfather in one, a Ganesh-like
figure in another.
Johnson
enjoys putting “little things for people to discover” in his paintings. He uses
a lot of food imagery. Often, it’s fast food that he utilizes to critique
American capitalist culture. It’s a recurring theme that pops up in his
paintings, but he keeps the meaning very open. “I’m not really thinking why the
fries and hamburger would be dancing on the piano… it’s just available
iconography to me. I wanted something on the tabletop to punctuate the wood
grain.” And what wood grain! Wild, yet controlled it’s like an evocative
caricature of wood grain. His approach to this one this one element neatly sums
up his inventive and elaborate approach to subject and process.
http://www.aaronjohnsonart.com/
