Marc Johnson is an award-winning artist and filmmaker who works in Paris.

“Marc Johnson encompasses a vision of enormous ingenuity, scope and scale. Marc Johnson’s work is expansive in that it collapses time and space by tapping both ancient knowledge and ritual in concert with current computer technologies. […] he demonstrates enormous cultural fluency identifying people and sites globally from Chongqing, China to Moray, Peru, as he attempts to locate old and new life-affirming patterns. His process is equally expansive, as he prefers to collaborate with experts across disciplines from the biological sciences to archaeology and ethnography, searching for new avenues to express life’s most profound secrets. Inherent in this work is a spiritual quest for deep connectivity with complex ideas as well as a desire to reach diverse global audiences.” Excerpt from “YúYú” exhibition booklet, Ed. Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art, 2017.

Betti-Sue Hertz, Director and Chief Curator at Wallach Art Gallery, Columbia University

ABOUT MARC JOHNSON (France/Benin, b. 1986)

Marc Johnson is an artist, architect, and filmmaker who lives and works between Paris, Stockholm and Vancouver. His work has been shown extensively around the world. Important individual exhibitions include The Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti-Shrem Museum of Art, UC Davis, United States (in collaboration with the Kramlich collection); La Maréchalerie, contemporary Art Center, Versailles, France and The Zentrum fur Medienkunst (Werkleitz Gesellschaft e.V.), Halle, Germany.

He has participated in the Sundance Film Festival (2016, 2018), the Biennale of Moscow for Young Art (2017, 2018), The Berlin International Film Festival, Berlinale Shorts (2015), the Yvonne Rainer Project at the Galerie Nationale du Jeu de Paume (2014) and more than 50 International Film Festival worldwide.

Major group exhibitions include “OLHO“, Museo de Arte Moderna, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; “constellation•s, new ways of living in the world”, arc en rêve centre d’architecture, Bordeaux, France; “trans(?)duction“, CNEAI= Centre National Edition Art Image, Chatou, France and “ATM tempo I/II/III”, Ginza Maison Hermès Le Forum, Tokyo, Japan.

He received the LVMH Young Artist Award in 2009, was awarded the Best Short Film Award from the Las Palmas International Film Festival de Gran Canaria in 2016, the Cornish Family Prize for Art & Design Publishing from the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne in 2017 and the Best Short Film Award from the 10th Annual Milwaukee Film Festival in 2018.

AWARDS & GRANTS

2021-25 PhD candidate in performative and media-based practices, Stockholm University of the Arts, Sweden.

2019 i-Portunus – mobility grant for artists – Creative Europe, Germany.
2019 Screenwriting grant, Région Ile-de France, France.
2019 Vancouver Biennale – residency grant, Canada.
2018 Best Experimental Short, 10th Annual Milwaukee Film Festival, United States.
2018 Aide individuelle à la Création – DRAC d’Ile-de-France, France.
2017 Cornish Family Prize for Art & Design Publishing, National Gallery of Victoria, Australia.
2017 Rooftop Film – 2017 Rooftop Filmmakers Fund Short Film Grant, United States.
2016 CNC-DICRéAM – production grant (“Ultraviolet” short film), France/Thailand
2016 Best Short Film Award, International Film Festival de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Spain.
2016 CNC-DICRéAM – production grant (Fieldwork in Moray, Peru), France/Peru.
2015 Third Prize, experimental, Athens International Film + Video Festival 2015 (AIFVF), United States.
2009 Jean-François & Marie-Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre Foundation Award, France.
2009 Maurice Colin-Lefrancq scholarship (Hunter College), France/United States.
2009 LVMH Young Artist Award / Prix LVMH des Jeunes Créateurs, France.

SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY

Publication as Author

Marc Johnson, “fecund lacuna: art, archaeology, genetics,” Arles: Analogues & La Maréchalerie, 2016.

Marc Johnson, “Posthumanism: present and future paths towards equality of all species on earth and beyond?“ In Afrikadaa, no. 12, l’Entre Deux Monde. l’Art Comme Arme de Guérison, (May 2019): 117-120.

Marc Johnson, “Bang Bang! To Darkness, Charlotte and other songs, the body at risk, Steve McQueen at Schaulager.” In Afrikadaa, no. 6, E-motional, (Oct, Nov, Dec, 2013): 114-121.