Lester Johnson: 1 In New York and P-town BY BURT CHERNOW A Provincetown of the past is in Lester Johnson's blood and in the paint that drips from his brush. "I really loved the place," he said. Beginning in 1954, for a string of formative summers, Provincetown's dunes, water, light and the joie de vivre of restless emerging artists helped shape his unique vision. By the time Johnson arrived in the celebrated art colony, he had learned to trust his intellectual intuition and the natural physicality of painting. Yes, artists like Milton Avery, Adolph Gottlieb and Robert Motherwell roamed this small, idyllic outpost, but what at- tracted Johnson and other artists was the place and its spirit. The art classes of Hans Hofmann, teacher extraordinaire, offered an added attrac- tion. Art critic Irving Sandler, who washed dishes during the early '50s in P-town, quietly slipped into Hofmann's Friday critiques, since "every- cleaned up. At night there were poerry readings. body knew that Hofmann was the best teacher That's where I met Dominic Falcone and Yvonne anywhere (and they were right)." Hofmann had Anderson. They were interested in my work." a way of convincing students that they could The next summer, Johnson had his first of five and should succeed his generation as the van- exhibitions and became the only artist to show guard of a new fraternity of vital artists. annually at the Sun Gallery, 393 Commercial Born to a large Lutheran family in Minne- Street in Provincetown. The space, founded by apolis in 1919, Johnson studied at the Minne- Falcone and Anderson and devoted to "new apolis School of Art, the St. Paul Art School, and voices," debuted in 1955, lasted five summers later at the Chicago Art Institute. He was intro- then disappeared into P-town folklore . Ander- duced to Hofmann's teaching approach, particu- son and Falcone supported the operation on larly the "push and pull" effects of form and color meager salaries and with youthful enthusiasm. LESTER JOHNSON, "BOWERY SILHOUETIES." 1963 by St. Paul teachers Alexander Masley and Anderson recalled, "Shows closed on midnight Cameron Booth, both of whom had studied with Sunday. We drew our orange curtains until the Hofmann in Munich. In 1947 Johnson moved drips, the gestures- it was so beautiful and ev- opening of the next show- nine o'clock on to New York and became one of the first down- erybody loved them but they were empty. I was Monday night. The artist or artists would paint town loft-dwellers. He shared a lower East Side into human content so I used it, and I found it a their names on the window before the open- studio with Larry Rivers and attended some of very, very exciting thing to do. I did a lot of paint- ing- by then people would be crowding the Hofmann's New York classes. Rents were cheap ings at the time where you can hardly see the street waiting for the moment when the curtains but Johnson was broke much of the time as he figure, but it's there." would open." tried to support his painting through a variety of Johnson adopted the working techniques of Paint dripped freely down the glass from part-time jobs, including teaching art. In 1950, action painting. He used a great deal of paint. A Lester Johnson's signature each summer the Sun he and Philip Pearlstein shared a studio space; tube of oil paint might be expended in seconds Gallery survived. "A town crier announced the Lester's wife, Jo, had introduced the two artists as he, like Pollock, physically projected himself exhibitions," he said. "I remember Hans at a time when she and Pearlstein were study- into the work. The images that Johnson pro- Hofmann came to some of my openings. Dam ing art history at New York University. Johnson's duced were not decorative, but stubbornly con- and Yvonne had good-natured arguments with various studios, on the Bowery and elsewhere, frontational: oversize, brooding, thickly en- him because he worked abstractly." Other figu- were always one flight up with a view of crusted, scarred surfaces that were alive with rative artists who showed at the avant-garde Manhattan's active street life. No wonder, for recognizable objects and figures. Even today, few space included: Red Grooms, Mary and Robert almost 50 years now, street scenes have been a realize how difficult Johnson's choice of subject Frank, Alex Katz, Allan Kaprow, Marcia Marcus, dominant part of his art. was in an adamantly pro-abstract art climate. Dody and Jan Muller, Lucas Samaras, Bob Th- During the early 1950s, Johnson became as- Sculptor George Segal recalled, "The Abstract ompson, Jay Milder, and Tony Vevers. Most of sociated with the Hansa Gallery Group, the lOth Expressionists were legislating any reference to these young artists had studied with Hofmann Street Co-op Movement, and had his first one- the physical world totally out of art. This was and shared an unease with the perceived ortho- man show at Artists Gallery. Johnson became a outrageous to us ." Rebellion came naturally to doxy of abstract painting. member of the famous 8th Street "Club" which Lester Johnson. He would tenaciously remain By the mid-'50s, Johnson's resolute commit- met weekly. There, at the Cedar Bar, and at open- outside the mainstream. Nonetheless, he pro- ment to the figure and forceful imagery an- ings he became acquainted with artists who were duced a body of work that influenced several nounced a decisive breakthrough, setting an ex- to play historic roles in Irving Sandler's classic generations of younger painters and confounded ample for attentive young painters. Several im- an art establishment in need of neat categoriza- portant art critics noticed. James R. Mellow said, tion. The most common phrase used to describe "Johnson h<:s made himself one of the masters Johnson: "One of the most respected and influ- of contemporary figure painting, in a style that ential second-generation Abstract Expression- is unequivocally his own." Harold Rosenberg ists." Indeed, he remains so. In fact, it is hard to agreed, "Lester Johnson has drawn a mysteri- find a serious painter of any persuasion who does ous, unpredictable and moving image. One could not respect and follow the remarkable evolution not have arrived at this image through analyz- of Johnson's art. He is one of the few painters ing society or through analyzing painting. It was whose work holds significance for both abstract brought into being by the act of painting itself, and figurative artists. and it could emerge only as painting." In 1954 Johnson hitchhiked to Provincetown. Johnson would enlarge the scope of abstract He described the experience in an exhibition expressionism, going beyond de Kooning's catalog, ''The Sun Gallery," published by the "Women" and Pollock's late black-and-white Provincetown Art Association and Museum in figurative imagery. Stanislavski's comment, LESTER JOHNSON (R IGHT) WITH WILLEM DE KOONING 1981: "I found a place andJo came up afterward. "There are no accidents in art, only the fruits of PHOTO BY DOROTH Y BESKIN D There were many spaces that had been con- long labor," is applicable to Johnson's work. As verted into beautiful studios close to town. One an action painter he learned to exploit acciden- book of the period, The Triumph ofAmerican Paint- summer I worked at Pablo's, a Spanish restau- tal events, developing an approach that was nei- ing. At the Club, an exchange of ideas often rant. I painted all day and washed dishes at night. ther preconceived not arbitrary. Freedom of ac- turned heated. Johnson became a target for dog- Another summer, Mary Oliver hired me as a tion and spontaneity encounter self-imposed matically abstract painters because of his persis- bartender for her restaurant/inn. Jimmy Sim- artistic conditions that focus Johnson's aesthetic tently figurative work. "You're a good painter," mons, a poet, gave me my first job. He had this energies. His world is one in which freedom and they would admit, "too bad you're on the wrong unique little restaurant, The House of Art. It was structure, action and limitations are essential and side of the fence." Johnson called to mind his self-service. People came in, made their own interdependent. long experience with action painting, a format orange juice, toast or hamburger, then they had "I have no interest in balance, because bal- associated with non-figurative abstract expres- to figure out what they owed. There was a ance is static," Johnson says. "It is the dynamic sionism in its heyday. In an interview in 1988 bucket hanging where you left money. People quality of life that I try to reflect in my paint- he said, "I thought it very quickly became a were honest. Simmons would go off and leave cliche, .. it was too easy, they could make the me there; I organized things, directed traffic and PRO VI NCETOWN ARTS 1996 Page 91 ings." Not simply movement, but the nature works, like "Bowery Silhouettes," through his force, the continuum that interested Pollock, light-drenched, more recent canvases, Johnson Tobey, and others in the New York School, is continues to take considerable risk while reject- articulated as figure painting. Johnson's paint- ing formulas. ings clearly go beyond the non-continuous "Street Scene with Four Men" is packed with works of de Kooning, who despite his other de- action and counter-action, pushing and pulling partures, maintains the traditional isolation of that oscillate on a flattened picture plane. There the figure within his compositions.