Heather L. Johnson grew up on the move, discovered motorcycles late in life, and makes art from the vantage of a drifter. She hand stitches detailed embroideries based on experiences from the road, looking for patterns and cycles in the world that reveal the fragility of humans in relation to the environment and to one another.
Heather’s current work stems from her ongoing motorcycle travel project, In Search of the Frightening and Beautiful (https://thefrighteningandbeautiful.blogspot.com). While traveling, she gives small stitched pieces to strangers, while collecting experiences she later translates into new bodies of work. She has ridden over 38,000 miles through 14 countries, releasing 47 artworks around the Western Hemisphere. During her residency at HCCC, she will plan the next ISFB journey and craft new embroideries in preparation for returning to the road in 2019.
For over 20 years, Heather has shown her work in galleries, museums, and in the public realm throughout the U.S., in Europe, and Japan. She earned an MFA from California College of the Arts in 2001 and has since completed several artist residencies, most recently at Cherryhurst House in Houston, where she currently resides. Many of her road stories are published in the online magazine RideApart (https://rideapart.com/). To learn more about Heather, visit heatherljohnson.com/.
