Freight + Volume is pleased to present Ezra Johnson’s Home and Garden Show, featuring a new group of paintings and sculpture by Ezra Johnson. The title alludes to the home improvement lifestyle - indoor and outdoor - and the labor involved. These paintings are primarily set in Tampa, FL, where swamp, jungle and suburb overlap and where the artist lives. They are in conversation with many recent and past American painters such as McEneaney, Porter, Neel, Freilicher and others. Johnson begins each work with direct observation from life, followed by a laborious (and sometimes chaotic) studio process of revision and overpainting.

Monsters Live in Your Head is comprised of 21 facades of suburban American homes; in front of each home appears a simple signboard posting a letter. The collective effect spells the title: Monsters Live in Your Head. The phrase isn’t aimed at the individuals in these specific homes, but rather hints that we can easily become isolated individuals, trapped within our own subjective experiences. Johnson began this series of paintings from his car while driving around town.

In several of the works, Johnson paints scenes of his family: Haircut, Who Are You? and Kid at the Party, each blending initial observation and iterative studio work. Surfaces become layered as the paintings evolve, details are pared back, and colors have been chosen for their sensations rather than realism.

In Studio Table, the artist’s studio appears cluttered, a kaleidoscope of color and canvases, scattered together around a wooden worktable. This table is the central station of the artist’s studio practice, which often expands from painting into sculpture and animation. In Paint Cans, piles of colorful cans are strewn throughout the gallery; the initial believability comes from the notion that no one would look closely enough to question their existence. Upon closer inspection the cans are tubular paintings. The artist’s colors are piled up and spilling out - they were made using the overmixed paint from Johnson’s other works. It’s an experiment in how color exists as both a fact and as a poetic illusion, with meaning difficult to pin down.

In addition to his multifaceted painting practice, Johnson has extensive experience with stop frame animation, carpentry and renovation (particularly on his residences in Florida and London, and his various studios).  These talents serve the artist well on his mission to celebrate and elevate the mundane, the everyday objects and routines of home and garden, and of life.  Whether it's recycling plastic waste, repurposing paint cans or simply watching his son get a haircut, Johnson examines the basics - the nuts and bolts of existence - and through evolved artistic practice makes all of this refined. 

--

Ezra Johnson (b. 1975, Wenatchee, Washington) lives and works in Tampa, Florida and London, UK. He received his MFA from Hunter College, New York, NY (2006) and his BFA from California College of Arts and Crafts, San Francisco, CA (2000). Past museum and institutional exhibitions include Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA (“Hammer Projects: Ezra Johnson,” 2007); Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, Overland Park, KS (“Domestic Seen,” 2016-17); Tampa Museum of Art, Tampa, FL (“Skyway: A Contemporary Collaboration,” 2017); Museum of Fine Arts, St. Petersburg, FL (“Skyway,” 2020); SITE Santa Fe, Santa Fe, NM (2010); Institute for Contemporary Art, Philadelphia, PA (2010); and Museo de Arte Contemporáneo Querétaro / Fundación AMMA, Mexico City (2023). Johnson’s work is held in major collections including Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA; Louis Vuitton Foundation, Paris, France; Rubell Family Collection, Miami, FL; and Museo de Arte Contemporáneo Querétaro / Fundación AMMA, Mexico City.