EVERTON – When crowds of people from all over the world bustle through Times Square in New York City this summer, they may glance up and see a billboard glowing with artwork created by an artist from a hamlet in Wellington County.
Susan Johnson has been recognized by ArtTour International Magazine (ATIM) with a Top 60 Masters Award for her multimedia piece entitled Fear.
Johnson is an inventor, teacher and environmentalist, and this is the 10th award she has received for her art.
This one comes with the opportunity to have the art digitally showcased on a Times Square billboard and featured in the annual ATIM Top 60 Masters Book.
“This is a testament to your exceptional talent and the profound impact your work has had on the art community,” stated ATIM founder Viviana Puello in an email to Johnson, informing her she was selected for the award.
Johnson is set to travel to New York City this June to accept the award during a televised ceremony at the Museum of Arts and Design in Columbus Circle.
There, Johnson will receive a 24-carat gold-plated sculpture of an angelic figure with wings spread wide, standing almost a foot tall.
This year, Puello opted to have the award painted with bright red enamel, “reflecting a year full of world events that have threatened social justice and international peace,” ATIM officials state.
This shiny red statue may bring Johnson back to the moment that inspired her award-winning art piece: a life-altering moment involving a shiny red car.
A shattered wing mirror
Johnson was driving a car that held a special place in her heart – a red Subaru she bought outright with money she earned through her art.
The icy road she drove along was slick, and that treasured red Subaru lost control, and wound up smashed in a ditch.
Fear depicts the image of a shattered wing mirror, and brings Johnson back to that moment, when the car finally came to a stop, and she looked into the broken glass, fearful of what would come next.
Susan Johnson’s multimedia piece, Fear, was selected for ArtTour International’s Top 60 Masters Award. Submitted image
Everything Johnson saw through that cracked glass was warped, “which gave me a distorted view of the environment around me,” Johnson said.
This glass becomes a cracked lens to see the world through – “what an interesting way to look at our fractured world,” Johnson said.
There is a mysterious figure in the fragmented glass.
It could be a police officer, Johnson offered, or the figure could be death itself, saying “‘Jeez, you just missed, kiddo.’”
Whoever the viewer imagines that figure to be, there’s a message Johnson hopes they take away from the piece: “You never know what’s coming.”
That fractured wing mirror made such an impression on Johnson that when she was told the car was a write-off, she opted to keep the mirror.
“It’s in the cupboard over there,” she said, gesturing towards storage space in her colourful home studio in Everton.
Multimedia piece
Johnson created the piece by painting Japanese washi paper and gluing it atop multiple pieces of recycled canvas that were patched together into one.
Between the washi paper and recycled canvas are pieces of wool and string, giving the artwork a three-dimensional texture.
For more information about Johnson and her art, visit strachanjohnson.com.
For more information about the ATIM award visit top60masters.com.
