Alan Johnston is considered one of the leading British geometric abstract artists. He is best known for his large-scale wall and ceiling drawings and architectural interventions. His subtle pencil works are characterized by a rigorous minimalistic style and a tendency towards the invisible, or, as the artist puts it, an “ever-present engagement with the creation of shadow."
The exhibition Invisible Lines at Safn Berlin will feature several wall drawings as well as a number of small scale paintings. The wall drawings take the form of short irregular pencil marks, closely interwoven to form geometric shapes. These delicate shapes, although hardly recognizable, are prompted by the walls around them, heightening our awareness of the architecture. The exhibition space undergoes a mundane, yet powerful and almost magical act of transformation.
This effect extends to the smaller works, which consist of wood or canvas on which heavy beeswax and pencil lead is applied. Often these works are constructed with a similar attention to space and/or negative space, while at the same time containing a much higher density of black in contrast to the muted wall works.
Johnston’s installations create an active relationship between the observer and the work which somehow lies between the visible and the invisible, the optical and the physical. His works are undoubtedly demanding on the viewer, bringing into play the complex connection between mind and eye.
'My work explores spatial contexts and relations through drawing and architectural construction, reflecting on the spatial and tactual implications in architecture where perceptual notions are rendered as common factors in sight and touch. This field is closely related to the work of Patrick Geddes, Philosophical Generalism, and Gesamtkunstwerk. This is a comparative context which has its roots in the practice of art, architecture and visual thinking in the West and the East, and relates to concepts and practices such as Wabi Sabi. I engage in collaborative initiatives in art and architecture with Professor Shinichi Ogawa, Tokyo, and Neil Gillespie, Edinburgh.'
Established at the turn of the century by Niklas and Daniela von Bartha, the London-based gallery, Bartha Contemporary, places a strong emphasis on non-figurative and conceptual works by mostly established American and European contemporary artists. Hailing from the second generation of the art-dealing von Bartha family, Niklas, along with his wife Daniela, maintains a retrospective look at underappreciated modernising movements of the past in the gallery programme, whilst championing the latest works of contemporary artists.
