BUTTER 2025 | JOHNSON SIMON

Johnson Simon (Indianapolis, IN) creates artistic work that suggests movement to the viewer. He desires to express himself through dancing, but his disability limits him from moving about the way that he would like. Instead, he uses his God-given gift of painting to demonstrate his desire to live life with no physical restrictions. He uses all types of movement in his research including walking, running, swimming, and skydiving. Simon even recorded his own movements and discovered his own rhythms. ​ Now when he paints, he chooses bright colors and broad and sweeping motions with his paint brush to transfer that feeling of movement onto the canvas. In his artistic work, he can move freely about without limitations. On canvas, he can run, walk, jump, and he can dance without being bound by physical limitations. In that way, the paint brush is an extension of himself. Johnson’s style of work is expressionistic. He uses heavy dark lines along with vibrant colors to display a sense of motion and flare. The human body is both complicated and elegant, and with the extra component of motion added, it is a vessel unlike any other in this world. To display this complex yet delicate device in motion, Simon makes use of vivid colors with heavy black strokes to show the sense movement.