When Leon Johnson talks about his work, it is hard to ignore the passion he exudes. It wells up in his voice as he sits in his Lawrence Hall office. His office symbolizes that passion, too. It’s a cozy space filled with books and pictures, and the lighting is much like the glow of a fireplace.
The art and multimedia professor is more than a teacher: He is an artist, a designer, a painter and performer whose works appear in almost every medium — canvas and film, print and theater.
For Johnson, art is more than an expression of beauty — it’s an avenue he uses to put the world in perspective. For him, art is his tool for commenting on social issues and allowing his students to do the same.
“I would love for students to leave my class with a different set of priorities that they are prepared to honor or validate,” he said.
Johnson’s own love for design was born out of political posters. Growing up in South Africa during the apartheid era, Johnson, 43, was mesmerized by how posters challenged government authority and white privilege.
“It was through the political poster that I wanted to be a designer,” he explained. “It was through my experience in designing that I wanted to become a teacher.”
The professor’s teaching is centered around themes and concepts which he said are not usually considered by most designers. In one visual continuity class, titled “The Gift,” students created a restaurant in Lawrence Hall and fed people for free for a week. In another themed “Third Geography,” his students addressed dominant images of masculinity and femininity in society and explored identities that didn’t fit in with either camp. In his current class, “Home,” Johnson said he hopes his students will explore their own personal conceptions of the domestic setting.
He said his teaching style is “restless, rooted in pleasurable inquiry.”
In Johnson’s class, ideas are not static. The teacher starts with an outline and then allows the class to find a direction of its own over time.
“I find it hard to invite them to play and experiment if I have a very secure, clearly defined template.”
Johnson’s teaching earned him the Ersted Award for Distinguished Teaching in 1998 and the University’s William’s Fellowship for Distinguished Undergraduate teaching. His commitment as a teacher is what makes him so endearing to his students and those who know him.
“There’s a presence to him,” senior Wayne Bund said. “When you hear him speak, he has an articulate passion for speaking.”
Bund said the most important lesson he learned from Johnson was how to connect art with daily life. He added that Johnson maintains the same intimacy in a class of 80 people that he has in one-on-one interactions.
Third-year graduate student Daniel Peabody, who was a graduate teaching fellow for Johnson’s class, said Johnson gives students the ability to find their own voices and create the work they want to create.
“For a lot of people, his basic design class is where people stop being artsy and start being artists,” Peabody said. He said the professor is not afraid of controversy or stating what he believes, adding that Johnson is probably the only faculty member who can wear leather pants to class and get away with it.
Many of Johnson’s colleagues also are inspired by his work.
Art department Chairwoman Kate Wagle said Johnson has the ability to motivate students to exceed their own expectations with energy and spirit and embrace their work with passion and vigor.
“Professor Johnson is the ‘rare’ individual and artist sought by most academic institutions,” Wagle said in an e-mail interview. “He is gifted, prolific and ambitious. The breadth and complexity of his own practice is seamlessly connected to strongly related teaching.”
Yet, school is just one part of Johnson’s life; he said he is dedicated to his “happy, precocious” sons as well as his partner. He is also working on several projects, including a series of paintings, a film, a pamphlet and preparations for a performance piece in London later this year called Remembering Wilde, a collaboration with music Professor Jeffrey Stolet and theater Professor John Schmor.
“I would hope that I’ve provided students opportunities to play, to experiment, to scrutinize, to criticize and, most of all, to deconstruct less as a critique than in the spirit of inquiry,” he said.