By: Jane Summer

Publication: The Register/Showcase, February 22, 1981

Johanna Jordan’s multi-positional, multi-colored, geometric sculptures, fashioned out of sheet-metal aluminum, have a feature that few pieces of art at able to achieve: depending on how they are placed or hung, they change…resulting in a piece of work that is able to change with its environment. It is changeable because from different angles, it can look like an entirely different piece. Even if one were to move the sculpture to another room, it would still work. In a sense, these pieces change with time and with the needs of their owners. The large pieces are made, as Johanna describes it, rather like a dressmaker makes a dress. The sheet-metal is laid out, and metal and bonding are cut in patterns to a urethane form that creates an inner structure. “It’s like draping a skeleton,” says Johanna, “or building an airplane. It’s a skin stretched over a structure for strength. The pieces are cut out-either laid out straight, or sometimes when they are already in place over the structure. Placed plane to plan, side to back, they form a shape changing from angle to angle. “I usually have a general image in my mind’s eye about the shape or curve, but until I get to that side of the piece, I’m never quite certain.” Johanna combines design with a sense of movement, and likes to feel like “it’s dancing across the floor.” She hasn’t always been involved in geometric shapes or movement. Her background in art and her earlier pieces consisted of abstract and traditional realism. But in her 20 years of sculpting, she has experimented and changed a great deal. One great impetus toward this change has been the John Lautner house which the architect built for her, completed in 1974. Lautner is a master of geometrics and space…and a great deal of attention was given to creating an environment for Johanna’s work. For instance, two wings of the house are joined together by a wall 40 feet long, for which Johanna created a piece of work. At that point in time, with a piece that large in mind, Johanna sought out a medium which would be more practical than bronze. She started using sheet aluminum, which allowed her to work in the size range she desired and gave her the flexibility to work in geometrics forms and shapes. She has even designed the Featherstone logs in her free-floating, open fireplace, which she affectionately calls her “Stonehenge.” At the time Johanna moved into the Lautner house, she was ready to burst forth from her traditional environment, and even sold two households of furniture toward that end. Her ideas for her work are taken from almost everything around her. “Mostly my ideas are sparked by something in nature. It can be the erosion of the stones on the beach or listening to Bach. Bach moves me in a cerebral/emotional way and fits into what I am thinking while I am working. He was so geometrics, so mathematical.” Johanna’s work is very difficult, partly due to her size (she’s 5’2”) and partly due to the tremendous amount of time it takes to create this type of work. Her husband is 6’3”, and realizing her love of contrast she says, “If there’s going to be a difference, it might as well be dramatic.” It has taken her three years to create the body of work she is currently exhibiting at the Abraxas Gallery in Newport Beach. Her studio is in the lower portion of her house, and the walls extend as high as 25 feet and as wide as 17 feet. Her pieces are painted with automotive acrylic, and colors are determined by how Johanna is herself affected by the piece. She has had no formal geometry training, which is extraordinary, considering the complexity of her work. But as she puts it, “If I knew what I was doing, I probably wouldn’t do it.” She also believes that it can’t go wrong if you relate one end to the other. Johanna says that she has to have her work look right from any angle and is constantly moving pieces about as she is working on them. She is very organized, and her studio is actually neater than most of the houses we live in. Johanna loves what she is doing, loves the changes she has made and looks forward to whatever the future brings. At any point in her career, Johanna Jordan’s work is well worth seeing and appreciating.