Maggie Johnson & Mitch Wake
Opening 21 May 2021
Maggie Johnson & Mitch Wake, Munchkin Land
Munchkin Land is a collection of mixed media artworks inspired by the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz and memories of a personal and emotionally challenging trip that lasted the course of several months. The characters in this collection, playful and eccentric in nature, merge qualities of strength and confidence with feelings of distress and vulnerability through considered use of form and colour. Like in The Wizard of Oz, this body of work explores a conflict between a desire to experience somewhere new whilst struggling with a longing for home and familiarity. In collaboration with photographer Mitchell Wake, photographs of various locations in Western Australia are featured and drawn over to connect the experiences had on this trip to life back at home.
Maggie Johnson has been practicing as an artist in Perth for the past several years having completed an undergraduate degree in Fine Art at the University of Western Australia in 2017 and a Graduate Diploma in Creative Arts Therapy at Murdoch University in 2020. Maggie takes much of her inspiration from her studies of Art Therapy and continues to base her artworks on exploration of identity, body image and social connectedness predominately through drawing and painting. Over the past year in combination with working on commissions and completing her studies, Maggie has expanded her practice to producing merchandise under the brand Magg Daddy.
Mitchell Wake is a photographer from Perth, Western Australia. He has been practicing predominantly with traditional methods of photography since 2018. His works are often inspired by the interaction between people and the urban environment with particular focus on the wide range of tonality that can be captured in natural lighting.
Design Leigh Craft.