Claudette Elaine Johnson (born 1959) is a British visual artist. She is known for her large-scale drawings of Black women and involvement with the BLK Art Group. She was described by Modern Art Oxford as "one of the most accomplished figurative artists working in Britain today"."Claudette Johnson: I Came to Dance , 1 June — 8 September 2019"
Modern Art Oxford.

Biography

Claudette Johnson was born in Manchester, UK. She studied Fine Art at Wolverhampton Polytechnic. While still a student there, she became a founder member of the BLK Art Group and took part in their second show at the Africa Centre, London, in 1983. Her talk, and seminar, at the First National Black Arts Conference in 1982 is recognised as a formative moment in the Black feminist art movement in the UK. Johnson's work has featured in important group exhibitions such as ''

Five Black Women ''Five Black Women'' was an exhibition at the Africa Centre, London, featuring the work of British artists Sonia Boyce, Lubaina Himid, Claudette Johnson, Houria Niati and Veronica Ryan Veronica Maudlyn Ryan (born 1956 in Plymouth, Montserrat) ...

'' at London's Africa Centre Gallery in 1983, ''Black Woman Time Now'' at

Battersea Arts Centre The Battersea Arts Centre ("BAC") is a performance space specialising in theatre productions. Located near Clapham Junction railway station in Battersea, in the London Borough of Wandsworth, it was formerly Battersea Town Hall. It is a Grade ...

in the same year, and ''The Thin Black Line'' at the ICA in London in 1986. Reviewing her 1992 solo exhibition ''In This Skin: Drawings by Claudette Johnson'', at the Black Art Gallery, London, artist

Steve McQueen Terrence Stephen McQueen (March 24, 1930November 7, 1980) was an American actor. His antihero persona, emphasized during the height of the counterculture of the 1960s, made him a top box-office draw for his films of the late 1950s, 1960s, and 1 ...

(at the time a student at Goldsmiths College) wrote: "What she does is to bring out the soul, sensuality, dignity, and spirituality of the black woman....Claudette Johnson's work is rooted in her African heritage. Her talent is as powerful as it is obvious." Lubaina Himid describes Johnson's work as "deeply sensuous" and "richly coloured". The artist calls the Black women in her drawings "monoliths, larger than life versions of women". Eddie Chambers notes: "These portraits were imposing pieces that demanded the viewer’s attention, as well as their respect." In 2011, Johnson co-founded the BLK Arts Research Group with Marlene Smith and Keith Piper, to re-examine the BLK Arts Group's body of work and historical legacy. In 2012, two major projects were staged by this research group: a symposium with a retrospective exhibition entitled ''The Blk Art Group'' was held at the Graves Gallery, Sheffield, and an international conference entitled "Reframing the Moment" was held at the University of Wolverhampton. Her work was included in the Guildhall Art Gallery exhibition '' No Colour Bar: Black British Art in Action 1960–1990'' (10 July 2015 – 24 January 2016). Johnson had a solo exhibition at Hollybush Gardens, London (17 November 2017 – 22 December 2017), where a series of seven of her large-scale works on paper was presented, about which '' Frieze'' magazine said: "As a body of work, it possesses a profound and tender intimacy." In 2019, her first major institutional exhibition since 1990 was held at Modern Art Oxford, the show being described as "an overview of one of the most accomplished figurative artists working in Britain today....her art sets out to redress negative portrayals of black men and women and to counter the invisibility of black people in cultural spheres and beyond." The reviewer for ''

Art Fund Art Fund (formerly the National Art Collections Fund) is an independent membership-based British charity, which raises funds to aid the acquisition of artworks for the nation. It gives grants and acts as a channel for many gifts and bequests, as ...

'' wrote: "Intimate, powerful and sometimes deliberately uncomfortable, Claudette Johnson’s studies of black men and women demand attention and command respect." According to '' Apollo'' magazine: "While Johnson asserts that blackness is a fiction created by colonialism, she insists that this fiction 'can be interrupted by an encounter with the stories that we have to tell about ourselves'. Johnson’s subjects, by turns defiant and wary, funny and challenging, represent the varieties of stories that can be told by, in the artist’s words, 'Blackwoman presence.' As Johnson says, 'I’m interested in our humanity, our feelings and our politics.' Her art encapsulates all this in the tenderness and wilfulness of the individual human form." Johnson's work is in the collections of the Tate London, Rugby Art Gallery,

Arts Council England Arts Council England is an arm's length non-departmental public body of the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. It is also a registered charity. It was formed in 1994 when the Arts Council of Great Britain was divided into three s ...

, Mappin Art Gallery, Manchester Art Gallery and Wolverhampton Art Gallery. Johnson was appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the

2022 New Year Honours The 2022 New Year Honours are appointments by some of the 15 Commonwealth realms to various orders and honours to recognise and reward good works by citizens of those countries. The New Year Honours are awarded as part of the New Year celebrations ...

for services to art.

Selected exhibitions

* 1983: '' Five Black Women Artists''. Africa Centre, London. * 1983: '' Black Women Time Now''.

London. * 1984: ''Into the Open: New Paintings Prints and Sculptures by Black Contemporary Artists''. Mappin Art Gallery, Sheffield. * 1986: ''The Thin Black Line''. Institute of Contemporary Arts, London. * 1987: ''The Image Employed: The Use of Narrative in Black Art''. Corner-House, Manchester. * 1992: ''In This Skin: Drawings by Claudette Johnson''. Black Art Gallery, London. * 1997: ''Transforming the Crown: African, Asian and Caribbean Artists in Britain 1966–1986''.

Royal Festival Hall The Royal Festival Hall is a 2,700-seat concert, dance and talks venue within Southbank Centre in London. It is situated on the South Bank of the River Thames, not far from Hungerford Bridge, in the London Borough of Lambeth. It is a Grade I l ...

, London, and The Caribbean Cultural Centre, The Studio Museum in Harlem and

The Bronx Museum of the Arts The Bronx Museum of the Arts (BxMA), also called the Bronx Museum of Art or simply the Bronx Museum, is an American cultural institution located in Concourse, Bronx, New York. The museum focuses on contemporary and 20th-century works created by A ...

, New York. * 2012: ''Thin Black Line(s)''. Tate Britain, London. * 2015–16: '' No Colour Bar: Black British Art in Action 1960–1990'', Guildhall Art Gallery, London * 2017: ''Claudette Johnson'', Hollybush Gardens, London * 2019: ''Claudette Johnson: I Came to Dance'', Modern Art Oxford (1 June – 8 September 2019)

References

External links

Claudette Johnson in the Arts Council England collection

A Claudette Johnson Study Day 2013, The Room Next to Mine by Marlene Smith

"Claudette Johnson"
at Diaspora Artists.
"Claudette Johnson on three decades of her black feminist art and what has changed since the early 1980s"
''Creative Boom'', 20 May 2019. * Fisun Güner
"A Q&A with… Claudette Johnson, artist exploring black identity and representation"
''a-n.co.uk'', 12 June 2019.
"Artist of the Month: Claudette Johnson"
Arts Council Collection, November 2018.
"Claudette Johnson"
at Hollybush Gardens. {{DEFAULTSORT:Johnson, Claudette 1959 births Living people 20th-century English painters 20th-century English women artists 21st-century English painters 21st-century English women artists Alumni of the University of Wolverhampton Artists from Manchester Black British artists English contemporary artists Members of the Order of the British Empire

Biography

Selected exhibitions

References

Further reading

External links