Claudette Johnson
2017
Pastel and gouache on paper
113 x 257 cm
This imposing drawing is the artist’s largest to date. Working on an epic landscape format, Claudette Johnson describes the terrain of the woman’s body in just a few contouring lines of pastel set against a swathe of deep blue. Her face is rendered with great care and detail; we feel the weight of her head resting on her arms. The drawing is based on a photograph that reminded Johnson of ‘the position that my mum would adopt in the evening when she was tired and lay down on the sofa after a long day’. With this work, Johnson reclaims the conventional genre of the reclining female figure – a prominent feature of western art – and makes it her own.