CV

ARVID JOHNSON
52 Bassett Road, London W10 6JL
Tel: 44-208-960-4376

Born: 1964 Southampton, New York
Education: B.A., Hunter College, New York
Computer Graphic Design,
New School for Social Research, New York

SOLO EXHIBITIONS
1999 Zenith Gallery, Budapest, Hungary
1996 Goodman Gallery, Southampton, NY
1990 Fiatalmuveszek Klubja, Budapest
1990 Angyal Gallery, Budapest, Hungary

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS
1993 Goodman Gallery,
The Moderns, Southampton, New York
1988 Emerging Collector, New York
1987 Terrence White Gallery

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Reviews

43 and Younger: 10 New 'Moderns'
by Phyllis Braff

Goodman Gallery

Identifying the generation of an artist sometimes matters, because factors like the decade of birth can explain a style, a direction, a spirit or possibly even a lack of spirit.
It can be argued that each age group at some point sees itself as 'modern', and that would tend to justify the use of 'The Moderns' as a title for the current exhibition of 10 Long Island artists born after 1950 at the Goodman Design Gallery. The large Southampton gallery is generally known for its emphasis on emerging artists.
'The Moderns' introduces the large abstractions of Arvid Johnson to this region (he has previously shown in Budapest and New York) and the powerful pieces are reason enough to see the show. Mr. Johnson's largest canvases take their energy from a vocabulary of fractured, somewhat interplanetary forms made to seem anthropomorphic. Some curve and undulate, and that helps them appear to move quickly over their black field. When the format is smaller and square, everything pushes inward with a feeling of dynamic compression.
Shapes give an added sense of vitality. Recognizable elements, including lips and beads in one example and plants in another, combine with hard-edged semi-geometric motifs in a manner that suggests that the artist has admired certain major paintings by Picasso.

The New York Times, Sunday, January 24, 1993

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A Galériak Utcája, Budapest
(The street of galleries)

Zenith Gallery

They are now showing the works of the American artist, Arvid Johnson. On one of his huge canvases, one can recognise the traces of an old painting roll with which the artist painted precise white flowers on an orange backdrop. The piece covers an entire wall and creates the impression of the interior of a house left after demolition. His smaller painting is equally surprising; the artist placed ice-cream motifs cut from a paper towel on a thickly coated white canvas.

Perspectives - 2 'Slow Season' Shows
by Robert Long

Southampton Press

Arvid Johnson's two nearly mural-sized abstract compositions, 'Untitled with Botanicals' and 'Untitled with Women', owe something to Leger and a lot to Picass's 'Guernica' - there's a whiff of Futurism here too - but that's a good sign in a 21 year old artist. These are good, active pictures. Mr Johnson can draw, and he has terrific feeling for form and colour. It will be interesting to see what he does next.

The Southampton Press, Southampton, Long Island, NY Thursday January 28, 1993

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