Aaron Johnson's Reverse Painted Acrylic Polymer Peel Paintings
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.
Aaron 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.
Aaron has been working
hard during his residency. The old VCCA magic has been at work for him: back
home, he paints full time and has a good studio, but he feels like he’s gotten
in twice as many hours everyday here. This is a good thing as Aaron has a show opening
at Stux and Haller Gallery, 24 W 57th Street, New York on February18!
http://www.aaronjohnsonart.com/
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