Suburban Dreams

Aaron Johnson brings his cosmic vision back to earth with a subversive twist on suburbia.

Palm trees and little bungalows, leisure shirts and sunburns; archetypal California underpins the otherworldly scene. Fluid figures emerge from glowing energy fields of colour, created by the artist's signature soak stain technique. While monstrous, the characters– and the tableau they inhabit – are spiked with humour. A sense of normalcy disrupts the figuration; kids are glued to the TV, bridging the gap between the real and imagined.

“I’m thinking about the idyllic idea of wholesome American life in the suburban dream – we all know there’s weird stuff lurking behind the surface.”