George Johanson ‘50 delivers the 2010 Homecoming Lecture
Painter, printmaker, faculty emeritus and alumnus George Johanson ’50 delivers the fourth annual Homecoming Lecture. The lecture coincides with Seven Decades of Painting, a retrospective exhibition of works by Johanson on view in the Swigert Commons.
Born in Seattle in 1928, George Johanson attended the former Portland Art Museum School, now Pacific Northwest College of Art, in the late 1940s, where he studied with Oregon modernists Louis Bunce, William Givler, Jack McLarty and Michele Russo. Responding to the work of these artists as well as to the New York School and European avant garde, Johanson forged a mature style and range of imagery characterized by its graphic immediacy, intense coloration and exuberant figuration.
After receiving a Bachelors degree in 1950 he went on to teach painting, life drawing and printmaking at PNCA for 25 years, retiring in 1980. Johanson speaks about his work, the people and places that shaped his practice, and his 60 year connection to PNCA. Introduction by President Tom Manley and Faculty Barry Pelzner ’77.
