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Seward Johnson
| A number of Johnson’s tableaus based on well-known nineteenth-century paintings are on view throughout Grounds For Sculpture. In the park are such favorites as Déjeuner Déjà Vu, inspired by Manet’s Déjeuner Sur L’Herbe and Family Secret, which is from Renoir’s On the Terrace. Johnson is also known for his life sized sculptures of ordinary people in contemporary life situations. These sculptures have been placed in public settings throughout the world, including Double Check, which depicts a businessman sitting on a bench going through his briefcase. Located on New York City’s Liberty Street near the World Trade Center, it has since become an impromptu memorial. Other sites where sculptures by J. Seward Johnson can be found are at Rockefeller Center in New York City, Queen Elizabeth Park in Vancouver, Canada, and in Washington, D.C. Johnson has also shown his work in exhibits in Asia, Mexico, and throughout Europe. J. Seward Johnson recreates Edouard Manet's (1832-83) painting, Déjeuner Sur l'Herbe, in his sculpture Déjeuner Déjà Vu with precise accuracy. It is difficult to distinguish between what is real and what is art. Johnson s three-dimensional play on a two-dimensional artwork brings Manet's painting one step closer to real life. Hidden from direct view, it is a piece which must be found, discovered. Passersby stumble upon it only to gasp in shock and then laugh once they have realized their mistake. Johnson explains: "I use my art to convince you of something that isn't real. You laugh at yourself because you were taken in, and in that change of your perception, you become vulnerable to the piece and intimate with it in a certain way." Quoted from Marta McCare, "Strike a Pose," Modern Maturity, Sept - Oct, 1995. | | 
Déjeuner Déjá Vu, 1994
cast bronze
62" x 132" x 360"
Courtesy of The Sculpture Foundation, Inc.
Photo: Ricardo Barros.com |
| J. Seward Johnson's Were You Invited? is based upon French Impressionist Pierre Auguste Renoir’s nineteenth-century masterpiece, The Luncheon of the Boating Party. In this specially designed and landscaped environment, viewers can actually step into the scene and mingle with the diners. In addition to the members of the Impressionist’s boating party are four figures seated around another table at the far end of the tableau. Joined in convivial conversation are realistic representations of sculptor Johnson himself with artists Bill Barrett, Red Grooms, and Andrzej Pitynski. A dashing character in period costume brandishes his cane and addresses those at the table asking, “Were you invited?” Phillip Bruno, collector and art gallery director, posed for this gentleman keeping out the party crashers. Since 1994, Johnson has been creating lifesized three-dimensional works based on well-known paintings that, as Johnson has said, “allow an intimacy with the paintings that the paintings don’t allow themselves.” | | 
Were You Invited?, 2001
painted bronze, 1/8
132" x 288" x 204"
Courtesy of The Sculpture Foundation, Inc.
Photo: Ricardo Barros.com |
| Copyright Violation!! depicts a portrait of the artist Claude Monet (1840-1926) as he paints the sculpture by Johnson entitled If It Were Time, which is in turn based on Monet’s painting entitled Terrace at Sainte-Adresse. When an edition of If It Were Time was on view at the Corcoran Gallery of Art during Johnson’s exhibition, Beyond the Frame (September 2003 - January 2004) it included this portrait of the French artist “violating” Johnson’s copyright. Through this installation the viewer is playfully confronted by the question of what constitutes an original work of art. 
If It Were Time, 1999
cast bronze and aluminum, 1/8
72" x 456" x 420"
Courtesy of The Sculpture Foundation, Inc.
Photo: Ricardo Barros.com
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Copyright Violation!!, 2004
cast bronze, 2/8; 72” x 64” x 55”
Courtesy of The Sculpture Foundation, Inc.
Photo: Ricardo Barros.com |
| Summer Thinking belongs to an earlier series created by Johnson in the 1990’s depicting one or more figures participating in a public landscape. Johnson’s incredible attention to detail and commitment to realism disarm viewers, inviting them to participate in the intimate space of the figure. The young girl portrayed in Summer Thinking lies on her stomach, propped on her elbows. Her focus shifts from the notebook before her and consequently prompts viewers to follow her gaze and to project their own narrative upon the figure. | | 
Summer Thinking, 1991
cast bronze, 2/8
60" x 72" x 55"
Courtesy of The Sculpture Foundation, Inc. |
| Johnson’s Erotica Tropicallis is based upon Henri Rousseau’s The Dream, painted in 1910. In the painting, a young woman reclines on a sofa and contemplates the surrounding verdant jungle, apparently oblivious to the danger posed by the wild creatures in her midst. According to Rousseau, “The woman, who has fallen asleep on the couch, is dreaming that she has been transported to this forest and is listening to the sounds of the flute player.” Johnson recreates rhythmic patterns and overlays of shapes punctuated by varying textures and contours to preserve the condensed spatial composition that characterized Rousseau’s original image. For the most part, Johnson’s realistic figures and Impressionist pieces rely upon the immediate natural environment to serve as a backdrop for the sculpture and thus share a common ground with the viewer. Conversely, the female subject of Erotica Tropicallis exists within a compressed, exotic dreamscape that bears a resemblance to a sculptural bas-relief, engaging visitors to participate as a voyeur in the surreal scene. | | 
Erotica Tropicallis, 2005
cast aluminum, Styrofoam; 1/8
130" x 212" x 108"
Courtesy of The Sculpture Foundation, Inc.
Photo: David Steele |
Bold, witty and playfully mischievous, J. Seward Johnson’s cast bronze Day Dream is situated in the Water Garden adjacent to the Domestic Arts Building. Based on Henri Matisse’s (1869 – 1954) famous painting, Dance, Johnson translates another two-dimensional classic into a three-dimensional, real-life fantasy wherein Matisse’s dancers have stepped out of the canvas to become part of an intriguing sculptural tableau. [1] Johnson’s work captures the expressive colors and the rhythmic movement portrayed in Matisse’s painting. The five dancing figures are lively and energetic as their bodies move in full, celebratory swing to, perhaps, the sound of folk music. Associated with Fauvism, the early 20th century movement wherein artists created expressionistic works using pure color and simplified lines, Matisse aimed to create a visual harmony on his canvases—perfectly uniting color and composition. Johnson intends to maintain that harmony in his three-dimensional work, Day Dream; however, with an extra twist and a remarkably daring sense of humor. | | 
Day Dream, 2007
cast bronze, 1/8
96" x 216" x 120"
Courtesy of The Sculpture Foundation, Inc.
Photo: RicardoBarros.com
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With this sculpture Johnson surprises his audience with a work that provokes both interaction and serious introspection. The sculptor makes use of two iconic and familiar faces depicting opposing emotional states - the first brought forth by a sculpted rendering of Munch's "The Scream," and the second suggested by Johnson's homage to Redon's "Silencio." The fierce intensity of "The Scream" offers direct contrast to its counterpart the blissful or even resting face of "Silencio." This dichotomy invites the viewer of the sculpture to find him or herself between two choices. As Johnson says, "We all reach places where we have to decide whether to work out a problem on our own, or seek advice, counsel and outside support. In this sculpture I want to challenge the audience to recall how that feels, or even come here with an issue and determine which road to take." The addition of a therapist's couch - set between the towering walls of the two emotions - provides a place for sitting and contemplating the next move. It might begin as a seat for thinking about the artwork, but Johnson hopes that the act of sitting or lying in this "chamber" will also bring about a deep and very personal reflection. More information on the artist can be found at http://www.sewardjohnson.com/. | | 
Chamber of Internal Dialogue, 2011
mixed media
258" x 114" x 135"
Courtesy of The Sculpture Foundation, Inc. |
| Other works by J. Seward Johnson on view in the park: Designated Coachman, 2001
cast bronze, 2/8
186" x 480" x 288"
Courtesy of The Sculpture Foundation, Inc. The Eye of the Beholder, 1997
cast bronze, 1/8
70" x 190" x 126"
Courtesy of The Sculpture Foundation, Inc. King Lear, 1982
cupronickel, 1/2
96" x 52" x 40"
Courtesy of The Sculpture Foundation, Inc. La Promenade, 1999
cast bronze and aluminum, 3/8
78" x 52" x 33"
Courtesy of The Sculpture Foundation, Inc. Lakeside Table #1, 1999
cast bronze and aluminum, resin
45" x 48" x 48"
Courtesy of The Sculpture Foundation, Inc. On Poppied Hill, 1999
cast bronze and aluminum, 1/8
96" x 84" x 60"
Courtesy of The Sculpture Foundation, Inc. Part of Nature, 2000
cast aluminum, 1/8
54" x 50" x 60"
Courtesy of The Sculpture Foundation, Inc. Pondering the Benefits of Exercise, 2004
cast bronze
84" x 99" x 116"
Courtesy of The Sculpture Foundation, Inc. Sailing the Seine, 1999
cast bronze, 2/8
60" x 72" x 55"
Courtesy of The Sculpture Foundation, Inc. There My Little Pretties, 1999
cast aluminum
36" x 30" x 40"
Courtesy of The Sculpture Foundation, Inc. A Thought to Consider, 2003
cast aluminum, painted
2/8; 58” x 65” x 58”
Courtesy of The Sculpture Foundation, Inc. | | _3.jpg)
Family Secret, 2000
cast bronze, 3/8
51" x 70" x 82"
Courtesy of The Sculpture Foundation, Inc.
Photo: Ricardo Barros.com | | | (Return to Collection) |
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18 Fairgrounds Road, Hamilton, NJ 08619
(609) 586-0616
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© Copyright 2005 Grounds For Sculpture.
All Rights Reserved.
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