Tappeto Volante is proud to present Submersion, a solo exhibition of recent works by Gretta Johnson, from September 30 and November 21, 2021. There will be an opening reception on Thursday, September 30, 2021.

Johnson’s paintings, watercolors, and cut-paper piece in Submersion evoke a magical, hallucinatory world that dances with cosmic symbols, fluid characters, and metaphysical metaphors. Began intuitively with a soak of paint, the presence of water, materially and thematically, plays an active role in setting this pictorial stage.

Giant flowers, cosmic roots, lions, and sun-worshiping anthropomorphic figures are intertwined. Houses, plants, and supernatural creatures recur throughout. Hard-edged symbols scurry over painterly brush strokes and are entangled in naturally occurring shapes. Color collides, organic forms inhale and geological phenomena dissolve within a molten picture plane.

Gretta Johnson is a New York-based artist (b. 1985 in Milwaukee, WI.) She received her BFA from RISD in 2008. Her paintings, drawings, and sculptures have been exhibited among others, at the Desk of Lucy Bull, Condo NY with Night Gallery hosted by Rachel Uffner Gallery, Paris London Hong Kong in Chicago, IL, L' Inconnue, Feuer/Mesler, Safe Gallery, and Assembly Room in NY, Holiday Forever Gallery in Wyoming and Harpy Gallery in New Jersey. In 2015, her second art book OOLM was published by Dark Chart Press, and she is currently working on completing illustrations for a book of Creation Myths from around the world, with text written by Susan Strauss. Johnson also collaborates with Grimm Artisanal Ales to design an ongoing series of otherworldly labels.