Commentary: Painting Is My Personal Passion

By Nils P. Johnson Jr.

YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – Instead of writing about the law, as I periodically do in our firm’s “Legal Strategies” page in this publication, this column is about a personal passion – painting, which I took up in my early 40s as a stress reliever. 

After a lot of work, I painted my way into the Copley Society in Boston and Allied Artists in New York. 

My mural, “Canfield 4th of July,” is on display at the Canfield Court and last year I did a mural for the Ohio Supreme Court that showed women’s struggle for the vote. 

Can I share two artsy things with you? The first is about process, the second philosophy. 

I start by creating, essentially, a color negative in acrylic, the under-painting.

To determine the proper hue for the bottom layer, I gaze for 30 seconds at the color I want to end up with on top and then look with unfocused eyes at a white surface.

Stare at a cool red for a few seconds and afterward you see a “ghost” image of Cerulean blue. Thus, yellow aspen begin their graphic lives violet and blue skies start out mustardy.

By allowing the underpainting to peek through – by not completely over-painting – the eye blends the colors, and places objects in space with great depth and luminosity.

Below is a before and after example of two lighthouses.

And now the philosophy:  A painting is not a photograph that merely reproduces reality. A painting filters a real-world image through the mind and soul of an artist who attaches a piece of himself. 

For me, like for so many others, the YMCA is a second home.

Last spring I started a 20-by-10-foot mural (see design below) at the Davis Family YMCA in Boardman. It holds people of all ages from the Y family – lifeguards, pickleballers, weight lifters, Camp Fitch kids and famous staff. 

Pay us a visit and get one artist’s take on that wonderful institution!

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