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Monica McKelvey Johnson

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American artist and activist Not to be confused with Monica Johnson.
Monica McKelvey Johnson
BornGrand Rapids, Michigan, U.S.
NationalityAmerican
EducationSan Francisco State University (BA, 2001)
CUNY Hunter College’s Integrated Media Arts Program (MFA)
Occupation(s)Artist, curator, activist
Known forActivism on student debt
Notable workThe Adventures of Dorrit Little
Websitewoolandbrick.com

Monica McKelvey Johnson, born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, is an artist, curator, and activist living in Brooklyn, New York.

Education

McKelvey Johnson has received degrees from San Francisco State University (BA, 2001), and CUNY Hunter College’s Integrated Media Arts Program (MFA). She also studied painting at the Pratt Institute in New York City.

Artwork

McKelvey Johnson was represented by The Jack Fischer Gallery in San Francisco and exhibited her artwork, including drawings, embroidery, gouache, in the show “STICK 'EM UP! STAY DOWN! GROW UP!” (June 14 - July 21, 2007). The exhibition was largely illustrative; Artweek described the works on display as “familiar and unnervingly odd”. She also creates and sells textile art.

She authored the webcomic The Adventures of Dorrit Little, which explores the plight of a graduate student with heavy debt who questions the wisdom of her education decisions and the value of her multiple degrees. Much of the protagonist's perspective and questions are based on McKelvey Johnson's own experience with student debt. The comic is based loosely on Charles Dickens’ novel Little Dorrit, which also confronts issues around debt, and seeks to create greater transparency around student debt. For the publication Food Equality in our City (2014), McKelvey Johnson created a comic strip representing interviews with Poughkeepsie residents who had experienced food insecurity. Her comics zine Riding for Two describes the need for greater awareness of the needs of pregnant people on public transit.

Curatorial work

As a volunteer at the all-volunteer Interference Archive, McKelvey Johnson has co-organized several exhibitions, including Our Comics, Ourselves: Identity, Expression and Representation in Comic Art, which has toured to George Mason University, the Thomas J. Dodd Research Center on the University of Connecticut, Storrs Campus, and the University of Connecticut at Waterbury; as well as Take Back the Fight: Resisting Sexual Violence from the Ground Up. The catalog for Our Comics, Ourselves, edited with Jan Descartes and Ethan Heitner, includes writing from comics creators including Sophie Yanow, Sabrina Jones, William H. Foster III, Ganzeer, Paul Buhle, Jan Descartes, Sandy Jimenez, Nils Hanczar, John Jennings, Leela Corman, Elvis B., Jay Odjick, and A. K. Summers.

She has worked as a production manager for Creative Time and as Manager of Exhibitions at the Alliance for Young Artists & Writers, curating and archiving winning artwork from the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards.

Writing

McKelvey Johnson writes about comics for The Rumpus and The Comics Journal. She has also written about student debt and arts education for The Hunts Point Express.

Activism

McKelvey Johnson founded the student debtor support group EDU Debtors Union in 2011, to advocate for union representation for student debtors She has spoken about student debt at the Left Forum, at NYU’s Winning the Crisis: Debt * Narrative * Movements * Counter-Archives conference, March 21 and 22, 2012, and at the Station Independent Projects gallery. Her activism on student debt was combined with her artistic work in Faces of Debt, an interactive installation which encouraged participants to speak up about their own student debt experiences.

References

  1. ^ "A Graduate Student With $88,000 in Student Loans Speaks Out". The Chronicle of Higher Education. 2012-03-19. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  2. "Reception & Curator's Talk Tonight! | News". timesync.gmu.edu. 15 September 2017. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  3. "Motifs: March/April 2018 | Crescendo". crescendo.interlochen.org. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  4. "IMA alumna Monica Johnson organizes show". Film & Media - Hunter College. Retrieved 2018-06-19.
  5. "Motifs: March/April 2018 | Crescendo". crescendo.interlochen.org. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  6. ^ "monica johnson. - my love for you". myloveforyou.typepad.com. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  7. Fischer, Jack. "The Jack Fischer Gallery : Shows". www.jackfischergallery.com. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  8. "VISUAL ARTS / New view / See the world through different eyes. Find out what's fresh, what's not to be missed and what you've got a last chance to see". SFGate. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  9. "San Francisco Art Galleries - First Thursday Art Openings: July 5, 2007". www.artbusiness.com. Retrieved 2018-06-19.
  10. Spicer, Jakki (2007). "Monica Johnson at Jack Fischer Gallery". Artweek. 38 (7): 14–15.
  11. Salamone, Gina. "Queens Museum of Art's gift shop spotlights borough artists, including wire, crochet, canvas crafts - NY Daily News". nydailynews.com. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  12. ^ Johnson, Monica (2014). "The Adventures of Dorrit Little". Women's Studies Quarterly. 42 (1/2): 95–108. doi:10.1353/wsq.2014.0003. JSTOR 24364911. S2CID 85212148.
  13. Contemporary, Temple (2013-12-06), Debt Day, retrieved 2018-06-19
  14. "The Adventures of Dorrit Little by Monica Johnson at Structural Patterns". www.ambriente.com. Retrieved 2018-06-19.
  15. "Food Equality Newspaper". publicgreen.com. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  16. "Riding For Two". Microcosm Publishing. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  17. "How New York's Interference Archive Keeps Activist Design History Alive". Eye on Design. 2018-02-16. Retrieved 2018-06-19.
  18. "Our Comics Ourselves — The Beat". www.comicsbeat.com. 29 January 2016. Retrieved 2018-12-07.
  19. "Our Comics, Ourselves: Identity, Expression, and Representation in Comic Art | Fenwick Gallery". fenwickgallery.gmu.edu. Retrieved 2018-06-19.
  20. Rhode, Mike (2017-09-19). "ComicsDC: Our Comics, Ourselves exhibit at GMU going on now". ComicsDC. Retrieved 2018-06-19.
  21. "Our Comics, Ourselves on Exhibit". Archives and Special Collections Blog. 2016-06-08. Retrieved 2018-11-09.
  22. "Take Back the Fight: Resisting Sexual Violence from the Ground up – Interference Archive".
  23. "Our comics, ourselves : identity, expression, and representation in comic art in SearchWorks catalog". searchworks.stanford.edu. OCLC 936716703. Retrieved 2018-06-19.
  24. "Playing the Building | An Installation by David Byrne". creativetime.org. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  25. "Designing an Exhibition". art.scholastic.com. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  26. "Behind the scenes: Archiving the 2016 Scholastic Art & Writing Awards | On Our Minds". oomscholasticblog.com. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  27. "Monica Johnson". The Rumpus.net. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  28. "Monica Johnson | The Comics Journal". www.tcj.com. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  29. "Hunts Point Express – Monica Johnson". brie.hunter.cuny.edu. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  30. "Occupying Student Debt | Dissent Magazine". Dissent Magazine. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  31. "Conference: Winning the Crisis | Debt * Narrative * Movements * Counter-Archives | March 21 & 22". in.ter.reg.num. 2012-03-06. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  32. DiSalvo, Jackie (2013-05-05). "Political Education--Occupy Wall Street's First Year". Radical Teacher (96): 6–15. doi:10.5195/rt.2013.18. ISSN 1941-0832.
  33. Projects, Station Independent. "Station Independent Projects". www.stationindependent.com. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  34. "Faces of Debt – iArt". iart.shashafeng.com. Retrieved 2018-06-18.

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