The Work
Painting, Sculpture and Jewelry
“A sculptor who paints”
Ronald Edward Johnson worked in three fields: he painted, he made sculpture in stone and wood, and after his apprenticeship as a goldsmith (1992 to 1995) he made jewelry. He saw himself as “a sculptor who paints”; the Main-Post profiled him under this title in 2010.
The exhibition text of the Fürther Kunst-Begegnungen in 2003 set the two side by side: the sculptures showed “great discipline and utmost precision” (translated from German), while his paintings “seem … literally to explode” (translated from German).
“When you sculpt, you work with an object; it is real. When you paint, you have the canvas, and it is only a symbol of an object.”
Painting
Acrylic and mixed media on canvas, on a textured, in places relief-like ground; also reverse glass painting. Poured and troweled paintings, color fields, reliefs in gold and bronze, dark nocturnes. A series of “Brücken‑Bilder” (Bridge Pictures) is mentioned in 2002.
Marble Dust, Paint Tube, Palette Knife
First he gave the canvas a body, a structure on which he set the paint; according to a gallery text, he troweled on marble dust mixed with a binder for this purpose. Over a brilliant red, blue or yellow ground he let lines proliferate straight from the paint tube, in loops, rivulets and coils. Once everything had dried, he scraped the painting down with the palette knife and reworked individual lines with the brush.
After a gallery text, the Main-Post (2011) and the art historian Eva-Suzanne Bayer (2003).
Originals from the estate
Ron the Dipper!
c. 1980 (per sales listing) · Mixed media on canvas · approx. 19 × 72.7 cm
Super Blue Circle Earth
1990 (per sales listing) · Mixed media, impasto on canvas · approx. 49 × 49 cm, circle approx. 41.8 cm
Red Face Person
1990 (per sales listing) · Mixed media, impasto on canvas · approx. 73.5 × 104 cm
Impasto
c. 1980 (per sales listing) · Collage and mixed media · at least approx. 17.5 × 19.5 cm
Gold relief and nocturnes
Untitled
Working title: Gold Relief
Mixed media, relief
Untitled
Working title: Nocturne with Moon
Untitled
Working title: Night City
In exhibitions
Untitled
Working title: Areas of Color
Installation view, photo from the estate (undated)
Untitled
Working title: Night Blue
Installation view with a marble sculpture, photo from the estate (undated)
Many of his works have no title, because “the title gets in the way” (translated from German). Working titles describe the picture; they are not original titles.
Sculpture
Carrara marble, limestone and wood: linden, mahogany, poplar. Soft bodily forms reminiscent of Henry Moore, yin-yang forms with sharp ridges and openings, triangular planes worked from rough stone blocks. The surfaces are smooth and finely polished.
Johnson stated in 1956 that he had studied with the sculptor Robert Laurent at Indiana University and that his interest in wood had been awakened there.
Source: Baltimore Afro-American, April 28, 1956
Between 2005 and 2007 he took part in three sculpture symposia, in Tauberbischofsheim, Würzburg and Ostheim vor der Rhön. All exhibitions and symposia
Sculptures from the estate
Untitled
2005
Stadtgraben, Tauberbischofsheim, donated by the Rotary Club; from the 2005 sculpture symposium
Abstract Sculpture
Marble, light, on a dark base · Height 38 cm
Installing a marble sculpture in the courtyard of Schloss Burgfarrnbach, Fürth 2003
Jewelry
Jewelry was part of his work from early on: in his 1956 solo exhibition at Aberdeen Proving Ground he showed jewelry alongside sculpture and painting, and between 1976 and 1985 he showed paintings, jewelry and wood sculpture on a single evening at the “Haus des Gastes” in Hofheim.
From 1992 to 1995 he completed an apprenticeship as a goldsmith with a master goldsmith in Schweinfurt (Main-Post, October 30, 2002). After that he made jewelry in organic forms, which in 2002 he showed in a display case of its own in his studio.
The Signature
He usually signed his paintings simply “Johnson”, as a rule at the lower right, on a few works at the lower left. Many works bear only a number instead of a title.
