As her title suggests, Visiting Professor of Art and Digital and Computational Studies Erin Johnson brings a technological savvy to the world of visual arts.
Johnson's use of digital media to tackle many “hard issues of the day” has clearly impressed jurors at the Ellis Beauregard Foundation, who recently awarded Johnson a $25,000 fellowship.
The fellowship is awarded annually and is paired with a solo exhibition at the Center for Maine Contemporary Art in Rockland. “I am so humbled and grateful for this award,” said Johnson. “I look forward to creating a new body of work with the foundation’s incredible support.”
“Erin is not only a fine individual; gregarious, with a sparkling intelligence, she is diligent and passionate regarding her work,” said Donna McNeil, executive director of the Ellis-Beauregard Foundation, in a statement on the group’s website. McNeil describes Johnson as one of a “burgeoning number of artists addressing, through the language of art, the hard issues of the day.”
In 2018, Johnson launched a new solo exhibition, a video and sound installation called Heavy Water, exploring the relationship between a nuclear waste site in South Carolina and the population of free-ranging, feral dogs that lives on the 310-square mile complex.
