How often do you actually sit down when you enter a video installation? Be honest. If you're like me you pull back the curtain, step inside, and plant yourself in a soft lean against the wall. It's a position that sets up an easy exit.
When the Ezra Johnson show at Nicole Klagsbrun was recommended to me it was referred to as "shocking". Oh, my. At the very least. When I walked into the gallery I was burned out, I was tired, I was beat. I was ready for the leaning and the leaving. After about one minute I took a seat and stayed planted until the last delicious frame. This is the shit, kids.
Johnson uses paintings to build stop-action videos, telling stories and throwing beauty at will against the gallery walls. The color tones somehow recalled the Ezra Jack Keats books of my childhood. Paintings are added to and subtracted from to create movement. Cut-out overlays are occasionally applied. Sometimes the painting remains still while the camera zooms in. Everything is moving, and I mean that in both ways. You really need to see this to believe it. Color my jaw dropped.
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