My name is Russell Johnson.  I’ve been creating art since I was a child.  I painted my first work at age twelve – my early works are further down.  I studied art and architecture for five years at the University of Minnesota.  In my early works below, you can see some of the variety of styles I explored.  I created my first series of geometric abstractions in pen and ink.  I opened my studio/gallery, Dorje Gallery, and painted a series of 65 works, as 24 x 24-inch airbrushed with gauche on primed/textured board, and a second series of 8, 48 x 48 inches airbrushed with acrylic on canvas. 

I took several years away from art to become a journeyman woodcrafter for residence and commercial interiors. Next, I pursued an architectural career in Los Angeles for residential and commercial projects.  In my spare time, I created digital art using Autodesk 3d Studio, and Corel Paint Shop Pro. 

Upon retiring from architecture, I found a new summer home in the hilltop village of Cordes sur Ciel in the south of France and began painting with acrylic on linen canvas in a more impressionist style.  In Cordes, I found my inspiration in the classical impressionists, who discovered beauty in nature and the real world.  There is real art and skill in creating this style of art. Quieting myself and observing the world, I come to a meditative moment while working and enjoy the peace that comes from communing with nature.  Time slows down, and I find inner peace.

The world has moved on since the original impressionists, and therefore I paint today’s world.  Instead of Monet’s hand piled hay, I painted round bales of hay produced by machines.  I paint cars occasionally, but decayed cars.  I enjoy capturing the time scale of decay and dissolution. 

Instead of painting pleine aire in the hot sun with oils, I paint from photographs that I take by the thousands.  They enable me to find images that are interesting and timeless like those of the classical impressionists.  The geographic center is Cordes sur Ciel, but they range various distances away as I travel and photograph the astoundingly beautiful landscape of France.  I exhibited at the Galerie Impressionniste on the Grand Rue in Cordes.

I hope that I can carry the flag of impressionism into the future – as it has never really died.  It is a way of painting that is just as relevant today as it was decades ago.  I don’t make distinctions in my work between subgenres such as pointillism, etc.  In today’s language, it all has to do with pixel size, contrast and color intensity.  I generally like to realistic colors, instead of pushing bright unreal contrasts.

I’ve completed over 230 works in my latest series of French paintings. They range through many different subjects, mostly landscape and architecture, some of which the classical impressionists painted, such as the water lilies.  My water lilies are quite different from those of Monet, as I usually explore greater realism.  Realism is the other end of the spectrum of pixels, where the pixels become very small.    Salvador Dalí once said that artists should learn to paint realism before exploring other genres and I took that to heart in some of my earlier airbrush works on canvas. 

I present for sale my works except for early works.  I am open to group sales for institutions, and I am open to gallery representation.