File:Tricia Gordon-Johnston Biography.jpeg

Summary
Born in Kingston, Jamaica in 1974, Tricia Gordon-Johnston lives and works in Jamaica, West Indies. She is a painter, installation artist and fine art photographer. Tricia's current body of work consists of process oriented pieces somewhat informed by Minimalism, Tachiesm and other Conceptual Art Movements. Generally her works are a complex of density, atmospheric vastness, enveloped linear composites, saturation and transient states of hegemony through fragility. They begin with colour and geometric shapes expressed as large scale forms and as fragments, parts of a whole (Gestalt Theory). Tricia previously confined and committed herself to the choice and investigation of red as colour. Presently she is exploring the primary and secondary colours of the Colour Wheel in conjunction with Metaphysical Theories as they allude to the intent of the work. ‘The Colour Wheel Series’ combines Images of the artist moving through spaces on an everyday basis, on her journey to her studio space, the work in the space and visually documents the process of working on paintings (the end product). The work therefore serves to document and share with the viewer the process of being an artist, the background or ceremony involved in dealing with issues in and of life, and how these issues are tied into a painting that is then mounted on a wall. The work also alludes to cultural, socio-political or personal signification. This is accomplished only if the viewer is willing to See the Colours as Primary, Secondary and Tertiary (Colour Theory, as educational system, etc.) as well as in relation to Metaphysical Elements (Elements of Design, Geometric Shapes, Scientific Symbols, Zodiac Signs, etc.) and as Marks (The Mark making process, Spatial Mapping, Hand Writing, etc.) and as Signs (Symbols, the Subconscious thoughts and desires, the Weather, etc.) and as issues that our individual deal with every day. The work is intended to create a synthesis between architecture (the environmental space), painting (via broad application of pure colour and large achromatic zones of saturation) and the environment, dictating the physical distance necessary to interact with the work. Space therefore becomes a complex agent; this is reliant on the concrete space as context, which informs the viewing of the work as related fragments of continuing body of work. Viewed as a work, there is also a manipulation of space, as occupation and absence simultaneously, with order as the rule that explains the relationship between them as forms, masses, lines, objects and as the symbiotic relationship between the pieces as a whole and their context. In a personal context, the work is introspective and aids in Tricia's signification of experience. These ideas all converge to speak as a metaphor to discuss ideas of genesis, generation, healing and identity. The viewer needs to bear in mind that an integral part of Identity or Identification is the ability to Identify Self with other People, to imagine Self in other Places and to put Self within other Situations or Spaces, to basically See the World from other Perspectives or Eyes, and in doing so the entire Human Race, as a part of the Animal, Environmental and Nature-al World can be viewed as Being One. Tricia is the recipient of The Delves Molesworth Award, The Institute of Jamaica (2006), The Jamaica Cultural Development Commission and National Gallery of Jamaica Visual Arts Award of Merit (2007). She is a member of the Jamaica Guild of Artists and Alumni of the Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts. She also represented Jamaica in the installation exhibition, Caribbean Crosscurrents, curated by Tina Spiro at Art Miami 2007.

GROUP EXHIBITIONS

2004	Miniatures; Wonderland Gallery, Jamaica 2005	Final Year Exhibition; The Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts, Jamaica Curator's Eye II; The National Gallery of Jamaica, Jamaica 2006	Painting Matters; Chelsea Galleria, Florida, U. S. A.	Young Generation; The Mutual Gallery, Jamaica The Super Plus Under 40 Artist of the Year Competition; The Mutual Gallery, Jamaica 2007	Caribbean Crosscurrent; Art Miami, USA The JCDC/NGJ Visual Arts Exhibition; The National Gallery of Jamaica.

AWARDS

2006	 		Delves Molesworth Award – The Institute of Jamaica, Jamaica 2007	               JCDC/NGJ Visual Arts Award - Merit