Ice cream cones, a lawn chair, arcade tickets, Saltines, and sliced processed cheese—to a spectator visiting the Saint Louis Art Museum’s newest installation, these seemingly common objects stand isolated. But to artist Tamara Johnson they come together to inspire collective memory, representing so much more.
A colander, a singular piece of blue tape, and other surprises are the stars of Currents 123: Tamara Johnson, on view through September 22 in Galleries 250 and 301. The amalgamation of hyperrealistic models of the ordinary items of American consumption are constructed from copper, concrete, and other media. Johnson’s work has been described as “hyper-naturalistic,” but Johnson prefers to reimagine her art—which imitates reality with near perfection—through the lens of imperfection, inviting visitors to look closer.
Stay up-to-date with the local arts scene
Subscribe to the weekly St. Louis Arts+Culture newsletter to discover must-attend art exhibits, performances, festivals, and more.
“I like there to be more questions than answers or solutions,” says Johnson. Hyperrealist art, to her, is “trying to present something that doesn’t seem like what it is. That is something I’m interested in.”
“Slow-looking,” the process of capturing a visitor’s attention for more than a moment, is the word Johnson offers as her intended effect for those who experience the installation. “I try to make multiple entry points [for interpreting my art] for someone who’s just like, Wow that looks cool to someone who’s like, Yes, this is about the industrial food process,” Johnson says.
Johnson’s art is open to viewer interpretation, but to her, many of the products she recreated represent remedies for people to “feel better.” (Find the message etched onto Johnson’s version of a barf bag plastered onto the side of the wall, facing the center of the gallery.)
“It is this open-ended, vacuous phrase that is seemingly hopeful but actually may be kind of harmful,” she says. “I was thinking a lot about what that meant just as a woman, as a new mom, and as a person. I was thinking about this phrase that gets told to me and the scope of its effectiveness,” says Johnson. Using mimicry as an interpretive medium, she invites visitors to challenge the function of everyday products through her art, reimagining banality.
The installation also features an accompanying video essay that echoes the vulnerability of her exhibit. “It’s a powerful visual. There’s lots of tropes, there’s lots of trite imagery that you’ll recognize really quickly, and that creates a tone,” Johnson says. “Then there’s some parts that feel a little bit more like a documentary and autobiographical.”
Beyond her Currents exhibition, the Dallas-based artist hopes to continue holding people’s attention through sculpture.
“I think if you are surprised by your own work, that’s a good sign,” she says. “I’m excited to get back into some of those other ideas I had when I was working on this show. I got to really do what I wanted to do, and that always feels so really nice—to be supported with what you want to do, I don’t know if there’s anything better.”
Currents 123: Tamara Johnson is on view through September 22 at the Saint Louis Art Museum. For more information and events related to this exhibition, visit slam.org.
