Luke Johnson is originally from Minnesota, and currently based in Edmonton, Alberta on Treaty 6 territory. Working in print, photography, and durational engagements within collections, Johnson draws from the stories and unintended afterlives of archival materials, creating works which complicate notions such as standardized categorization and stasis within systems of knowledge. He received his BFA from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and his MFA from the University of Alberta, where he taught printmaking and drawing from 2019–2023. He currently teaches at Red Deer Polytechnic in Red Deer, Alberta.
I am interested in the edges of knowledge: the boundaries between the discernible image and visual static; between thought and silence, truths and untruths. I enter archives, where we come to decide what we know and what we do not, and attempt to tease out the ways in which the forms of our understanding contribute to their legibility, or lack thereof. The knowledge itself that I encounter becomes form and content for prints, drawings, and installations; an inventory of precarity. My work perches between meaning and nothingness, asking a viewer what can be deciphered and what can be saved? What is it that we carry forward, and how do we decide what to discard? Are such decisions just? In documented traces of missing or discarded information and objects, and through the object lessons of my failed searches, my works stand as witnesses to the attempts we make to pass on what we know, and try to act as ballast—to slow an evaporation into the void.
EDUCATION
2020 University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB
MFA - Printmaking
2016 University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI
BFA - Print Media and Painting
SOLO AND COLLABORATIVE EXHIBITIONS
2021 There Were Nothing But Pedigrees All Around Us, curated by Adam Whitford,
Southern Alberta Art Gallery Library, Lethbridge AB
2020 All Things Considered, Fine Arts Building Gallery, Edmonton AB
2016 Glass House, Raymond F. Dvorak Gallery, Madison WI
2015 Christmas (Baby Please Come Home), with Finn Curry, 7th Floor Gallery, Madison WI
2015 Garden of the Forking Paths, Madison Central Library, Madison WI
SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2023 Atlanta Print Biennial, juried by Miranda Metcalf, Kai Lin Art, Atlanta, GA
2023 Ghosts in the Gallery, collaboration with Joni Cheung and members of the public, pop-up events at:
The New Gallery, Calgary, AB; Hamilton Art Inc., Hamilton, ON; Ada X, Montréal, QC;
Latitude 53, Edmonton, AB
2022 Speculative Energy Futures, SQUARE, St. Gallen, Switzerland
2022 The November Show, dh art world, Edmonton, AB
2022 Chopshop 6, curated by Derrick Buisch, Gelsy Verna Gallery, Madison, WI
2022 SNAP at 40, SNAP Gallery, Edmonton AB
2022 Codes of Conduct, co-curated with Aaron David, University of Wisconsin-Madison WI
2022 Re•Vision, Overture Center for the Arts, Madison, WI; Jill Krutick Fine Art, Mamaroneck NY
2021 Third International Print Biennale Yerevan, Yerevan, Armenia
2021 Tectonic Shifts, juried by Edie Overturf, Tippetts & Eccles Galleries, Logan UT
2021 At a Time: Tender and Tense, SNAP Gallery, Edmonton AB
2021 Bituminous Partings, curated by Alex Thompson, Fine Arts Building Gallery, Edmonton AB
2021 Okanagan Print Triennial, Vernon Public Art Gallery, Vernon BC
2020 10th International Printmaking Biennial Douro, Douro, Portugal
2020 In Place, SNAP Gallery, Edmonton AB
2020 Habitus, juried by Sheila Goloborotko & Andrew Kozlowski, Lufrano Gallery, Jacksonville FL
2019 15th Graphica Creativa International Print Triennial, Jyväskylä Art Museum, Jyväskylä, Finland
2019 Prototypes for Possible Worlds, curated by Natalie Loveless & Sheena Wilson, FAB Gallery, Edmonton AB
2019 4th Global Print, Douro, Portugal
2019 Devil's Dictionary, Gallery 224, Port Washington WI
2019 Printed Matter, curated by Alicja Habisiak Matczak, Kobro Gallery, Strzemiński Academy, Łódź, Poland
2019 Dyscorpia, curated by Marilène Oliver, Enterprise Square Galleries, Edmonton AB
2019 Habitus, curated by Sheila Goloborotko and Andrew Kozlowski, University of Dallas, Irving TX
2018 Stand Out Prints, juried by Crawford Alexander Man III, Highpoint Center for Printmaking, Minneapolis MN
2018 way out west, curated by Candice Corgan & Zack Petot, University of Wyoming, Laramie WY
2018 Eco Dirt Buffet Cabaret, curated by Natalie Loveless & Jessie Beier, Mile Zero Dance, Edmonton AB
2018 Felt, Society of Northern Alberta Print-Artists (SNAP) Gallery, Edmonton AB
2018 Salt City Dozen, juried by Ericka Walker, Sarah A. Coyne Gallery, Syracuse NY
2018 Anthropocities, IPCC Cities and Climate Change Conference, Shaw Centre, Edmonton AB
2017 International Print Biennale Yerevan 2017, Yerevan, Armenia
2017 Hello I Love You I'm Sorry, SGCI Conference, Atlanta GA
2016 Big Ten[t], curated by Barry Carlsen, ArtHelix, Brooklyn NY; Chicago IL; SoE Gallery, Madison WI
2016 Twin Cities Print Exchange, Boneshaker Books, Minneapolis MN
2016 The Last Sound on this Worthless Earth, 7th Floor Gallery, Madison WI
2016 Criminal, Overture Center for the Arts, Madison WI; Hoffman Gallery, Portland OR
2016 Suede Boots on a Wooden Floor, Ash Street Project, Portland OR
2015 I Love You When You’re Unhinged, 7th Floor Gallery, Madison WI
2015 And, Gallery 1010, Knoxville TN; Gelsy Verna Gallery, Madison WI; Drewelowe Gallery, Iowa City IA
2015 Apathetically Yours, 7th Floor Gallery, Madison WI
2015 87th Annual Student Art Show, Gallery 1308, Madison WI
2015 Manifestations, 7th Floor Gallery, Madison WI
2014 Fresh Hot Press, Breathing Space Gallery, Mount Lawley, Australia
2014 Tiny Hands on a Rubber Suit, Commonwealth Gallery, Madison WI
2014 Earl Grey, Art Lofts, Madison WI
2014 Midwest Multiples, juried by Hesse McGraw, Nemeth Art Center, Park Rapids MN
2014 Beyond the Horizon, Edith Cowan University, Perth, Australia
CURATORIAL PROJECTS
2022 Obscure Objects of Desire: Jack Damer & Lyndal Osborne, Fine Arts Building Gallery, Edmonton AB
2022 Codes of Conduct, with Aaron David, SGCI Conference 2022, Madison WI
2018-2019 50 Years Rat Free, with Phoebe Todd-Parrish, FAB Gallery, Edmonton AB
2016 Criminal, with Ryan Cain, Overture Center for the Arts, Madison WI; Hoffman Gallery, Portland OR
2015 The Gang’s All Here: 70 Years of the Madison Mafia, Art Lofts Gallery, Madison WI
RESIDENCIES, PUBLIC TALKS & PRESENTATIONS
2021 Art NOW lecture series, University of Lethbridge, Lethbridge AB
2021 SNAP Emerging Artist in Residence, Edmonton AB
2018 ARTiculations lecture series, University of Alberta, Edmonton AB
2017 Grand Marais Art Colony Artist in Residence, Grand Marais MN
2016 Guest Artist, Perpich Center for the Arts, Golden Valley MN
SCHOLARSHIPS & AWARDS
2022 Nominee, Queen Sonja Print Award
2021 Alberta Foundation for the Arts Visual Arts & New Media Project Grant
2021 Craig Hall Purchase Award - Okanagan Print Triennial
2018 Alberta Foundation for the Arts Graduate Scholarship
2017 University of Alberta Thesis-based Master's Recruitment Scholarship
2016 Finalist, Rochester Art Center Emerging Artist Exhibition Series
2015 Hilldale Undergraduate/Faculty Research Fellowship - with Emily Arthur
2015 Lois G. Roberts Scholarship
2015 Purchase Award - 87th Annual Student Art Show
2013 Kenneth D. Brown and Robert G. Kaentje Scholarship
2012 Catherine V. and Virginia E. Tenuta Scholarship
SELECT PUBLIC COLLECTIONS
DeWitt Wallace Special Collections, Macalester College, Minneapolis MN
Kulturdialog Armenien, Yerevan Armenia
Lake Effect Editions Archive, Syracuse NY
Oregon College of Art and Craft, Portland OR
University of Dallas, Irving TX
University of North Florida, Jacksonville FL
Wisconsin Union Art Collection, Madison WI
Zuckerman Museum of Art, Kennesaw GA
SELECTED PUBLICATIONS
SNAP at 40, book-length oral history of SNAP printshop and gallery, 2023
When to Stand and When to Run, essay, SNAPline volume 2021.2, Summer 2021
Okanagan Print Triennial 2021, exhibition catalogue, Briar Craig & Lubos Culen, 2021
The Body in the Library, essay, SNAPline volume 2019.3, Winter 2019
Dyscorpia: Future Intersections of the Body & Technology, exhibition catalogue, Marilène Oliver, 2019
Anthropocities, exhibition catalogue, 2018
1st International Print Biennale Yerevan 2017, exhibition catalogue, 2018
Big Ten[t], exhibition catalogue, Barry Carlsen, 2016
Transformations, promotional artwork and graphics for UW Opera, 2015-16
Illumination, Undergraduate Journal of the Humanities, artwork, Spring 2015
The National Scholar, cover and interior illustrations, Volume 1 (ed. Amy Dahlin), 2012
An Exchange with Sol LeWitt, exhibition catalogue, Regine Basha, Cabinet Books, 2012
