{"id":816,"date":"2009-10-29T06:42:25","date_gmt":"2009-10-29T11:42:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/newyorkarttours.com\/blog\/?p=816"},"modified":"2011-07-31T07:11:14","modified_gmt":"2011-07-31T12:11:14","slug":"sarah-anne-johnson-house-on-fire-at-julie-saul-gallery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newyorkarttours.com\/blog\/2009\/10\/29\/sarah-anne-johnson-house-on-fire-at-julie-saul-gallery\/","title":{"rendered":"Sarah Anne Johnson, “House on Fire” at Julie Saul Gallery"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Sarah Anne Johnson, "Explosion," 2008. Photograph courtesy of Julie Saul Gallery, New York.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

There are gaping holes in the shocking story told by Sarah Anne Johnson\u2019s latest sculptures and drawings done on old photos, but the omissions speak volumes. Filtered through the artist\u2019s own childhood memories, as well as first- and secondhand accounts, Johnson revisits the harrowing experience of her late grandmother, Velma Orlikow\u2014one of a group of unwitting patients under the care of a CIA-funded psychiatrist who experimented with brainwashing techniques. Orlikow was subjected to various shock and drug therapies, as well as bouts of prolonged, medically induced sleep. If such a tale can have a lighter side, Johnson looks for it, while also conveying the shattering effects of Orlikow\u2019s ordeal.<\/p>\n

Orlikow, who\u2019d originally sought treatment for postpartum depression, plays a starring role in the work, while Johnson\u2019s mother remains an enigma, prompting the question of how the trauma might have passed down through the family. It\u2019s also dubious how Johnson could find a comic element in her grandma\u2019s situation, offering diminutive nude sculptures that depict her with a squirrel\u2019s head or a nuclear cloud blossoming from her skull. (Did Orlikow herself have a sense of humor about what happened?)<\/p>\n

Yet an elaborate doll house, which could have been the show\u2019s most lighthearted component, gives sobering insight into Orlikow\u2019s psychological hell, with its hallway going nowhere, foyer under water and melting kitchen walls. While her daughter and husband sleep, Johnson\u2019s grandmother is shown dancing nude in the attic with her doctor, suggesting her sense of vulnerability.<\/p>\n

Eventually, Orlikow gave her testimony during a class-action suit that ended in a settlement. Johnson succeeds in adding feeling to those facts with stunning glimpses into the depths of her grandmother\u2019s suffering.<\/p>\n

Originally published in Time Out New York, issue 734, October 22-28, 2009.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There are gaping holes in the shocking story told by Sarah Anne Johnson\u2019s latest sculptures and drawings done on old photos, but the omissions speak volumes. Filtered through the artist\u2019s own childhood memories, as well as first- and secondhand accounts, Johnson revisits the harrowing experience of her late grandmother, Velma Orlikow\u2014one of a group of … <\/p>\n

Read more “Sarah Anne Johnson, “House on Fire” at Julie Saul Gallery”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[24],"tags":[8,29,18,9,15,14,13,12,36,17,10,16,34,11,35],"class_list":["post-816","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","tag-art","tag-art-criticism","tag-artist","tag-contemporary","tag-critic","tag-exhibition","tag-gallery","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-photography","tag-sculpture","tag-tour","tag-tours","tag-visual-art","tag-visual-arts"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2BDOD-da","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newyorkarttours.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/816","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newyorkarttours.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newyorkarttours.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newyorkarttours.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newyorkarttours.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=816"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/newyorkarttours.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/816\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":823,"href":"https:\/\/newyorkarttours.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/816\/revisions\/823"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newyorkarttours.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=816"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newyorkarttours.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=816"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newyorkarttours.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=816"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}