ARTIST INFO

LORI BROOK JOHNSON
Bakersville, NC

DRAWING & PAINTING

Penland Affiliation | Penland Studio Assistant 2015, current Penland School staff

Artist Information | Studio artist; education: MFA Clemson University (SC), BA University of North Carolina, Asheville (NC); exhibitions: Toe River Arts (NC), Clemson University Lee Gallery (SC), The Arts Center of Greenwood (SC), S. Tucker Cooke Gallery (NC); awards: 2024 NC Arts Council Artist Support Grant, 2018 + 2020 The Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation Grant

Artist Statement | My work is deeply tied to and inspired by my Appalachian roots and complexities. I am at once a coal miner’s daughter and a forever child of a single mother. Our lives have been hurdled and spaced by life-changing gifts, connection, and deep loss. We are individually, specifically, and collectively impacted by the coal mining industry. And from this place I discover and uncover, face and breathe into, hold anger and heal from the long-term generational consequences of exploitative labor. I draw to hold space and discover the vast realities of something that I have specificity with.

I draw as much for the sound as for the visual impact; the slow and quick beat of marks are a lullaby—a song for the mountains that long to survive. The soft building percussion of texture nurtures the neglected, and the pattern of plants and their breathing shadows reveals the strength of slow surfacing pain, of resilience, of growth. I draw into the healing grace of holding hands with grief and change. I draw as an act, as an immediate witness to growing up through the character and individuality of a place often mislabeled, misused and misunderstood.

Each drawing discovers, remembers, learns from, and leans into the unfeigned lived experiences of coal region communities and uses the rhythm and routine of mark-making as a witness to healing and loving care. The drawings are a life-long endeavor to learn and not to lecture. Mistakes will be made along the way and learned from in the next drawing.

The work is composed from an amalgamation of personal and archival photographs, memories, current connections, love, and need. In turn, routine and rhythmic marks create space for the subjects, the companions, to emerge naturally as much more than one portion of their lives thereby revealing a nearly concealed heart.