Frame tales by Larry Johnson
Marc Jancou’s new Chelsea space recently opened a solo exhibition of Los Angeles artist Larry Johnson. Johnson follows the tradition of John Baldessari and Ed Ruscha in form and idea. The works explore reproduction and appropriation through text based imagery. For this current show, Johnson pulls newspaper covers from the LA Times and coolly sets many of them against a Hollywood green screen. The newspaper headlines recall the devastation of the 1993 California wildfires but there is no emotion behind these images—as though pain and loss are simply a Hollywood production and not part of actual life.
Text and picture by Juliana Balestin