Beginnings

Beginnings employs intaglio processes to explore the visual language of emergence and genesis through abstract forms. Johnson likely worked a metal plate with drypoint or etching, allowing the characteristic burr and fine line quality of intaglio to suggest tentative, incipient shapes rising from an unmarked ground. The composition probably organizes forms at the lower or central field with open space above, reinforcing the thematic sense of something in the act of becoming. Johnson's Bauhaus-influenced training under Josef Albers at Black Mountain College informed her sensitivity to how form, tone, and texture carry meaning without representation. The intaglio medium is well suited to gradations of pressure and mark — thin, exploratory lines that do not yet commit to definition. Printed on handmade paper, a material Johnson also crafted herself, the texture of the substrate would contribute actively to the work's surface, so that paper and ink together enact the theme of things beginning to take shape.