Cut Rate Paradise
“Though beauty is, with the most apt similitude, I had almost said with the most literal truth, called a flower that fades and dies almost in the very moment of its maturity; yet there is, methinks, a kind of beauty which lives even to old age; a beauty that is not in the features, but, if I may be allowed the expression, shines through them. As it is not merely corporeal it is not the object of mere sense, nor is it to be discovered but by persons of true taste and refined sentiment.”
-Fulke Greville, Maxims, Characters, and Reflections
Mindy Solomon Gallery is pleased to present ‘Cut Rate Paradise,’ a new exhibition of paintings by Ezra Johnson. The artist shares an appreciation for the abandoned and neglected. With a sense of vision and sensitivity, they create works of art that galvanize an investigation of the unornamented as art. ‘Cut Rate Paradise’ will be on view December 19th, 2015 – January 30th, 2016 at Mindy Solomon Gallery’s new location in Little River, 8397 NE 2nd Avenue, Miami. An Opening Reception with the artists will take place Saturday, December 19th, from 7-9pm at the gallery. Festive libations will be served.
Ezra Johnson’s exhibition ‘Cut-Rate Paradise’ is inspired by Florida. This group of paintings and video reflect the mid-twentieth century promise of an inexpensive paradise for all, with no winter and a big house and pool, which ultimately loses its sparkle. The infrastructure of this promise is visibly crumbling and worn out. Signs no longer communicate messages because of sun fading and weather, but they retain original shapes; often, odd shapes, pointing at now vacant lots, faded and dusty. Johnson is not trying to make a negative statement about the American Dream; the truth be known, he likes these qualities, and regards them as beautiful and mysterious. Johnson states: “It is a pursuit of beauty that has been formed slowly through a combination of man-made infrastructures and weathering by the strong sun and jungle that is so haunting to me. My work is normally a response to my environment as well as inspirations such as literature, poetry or paintings. The writings of Joan Didion, Don DeLillo, Cormac McCarthy, Jean Baudrillard as well as paintings of Tal R, Edvard Munch and Josef Albers’ Homage to the Square series are sources of consideration and reflection.”
About Ezra Johnson
Ezra Johnson is a painter and animator based in Tampa, Florida and New York. He was born in 1975 in Wenatchee, Washington. He received an MFA in Painting from Hunter College, New York City, in 2006 and has exhibited his work at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles, SITE Santa Fe, and the ICA in Philadelphia, as well as prestigious galleries nationally and internationally, including Freight & Volume in New York. Johnson’s work has been shown in solo exhibitions in Paris and the Festival for Contemporary Arts in Pianello Val Tidore and Piacenza, Italy. He is the recipient of the 2014 Orlando Museum of Art Florida Prize.
