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Crossing Livingston County Again
Crossing Livingston County Again
Crossing Livingston County Again
Photograph and Ditital Image © Kalamazoo Institute of Arts. Not for reproduction or publication.
On View
Not on view
Object number2017.42

Crossing Livingston County Again

Artist (American, 1927 - 2017)
Date2014-2015
Mediumoil on canvas
Dimensionsimage: 36 × 40 in. (91.4 × 101.6 cm)
frame: 38 × 41 3/4 × 1 1/2 in. (96.5 × 106 × 3.8 cm)
Credit LineHelen Sheridan Memorial Fund
Label TextMarilyn Johnson called these abstractions of her latter years “roadscapes.” The term reveals their connection to her life-long attention to landscape. She composed this painting from sketches made in the car’s passenger seat on roadtrips to the Finger Lakes region of New York. A country road becomes a vertical, green shaft flanked by abstracted foliage and lakes. From this lower region of larger forms in calming greens and blues, we feel an acceleration toward the busier, multi-colored layering in the “distance.” The painting is neither a simplification nor an embellishment of a single view along the road. Rather, the roadscape, like memory, is a very individual assemblage of transitory visions and impressions along a greater journey. Marilyn Johnson was a positive force in the Kalamazoo art scene since the 1970s. A well-respected painter of portraits, urban landscapes, and abstractions, she exhibited regularly, winning local and state awards.

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