Press Release
“Where has all the Quiet gone”
June 6th-30th, 2005
Lyghtesome Gallery
Antigonish, N.S.

Throughout the year 2005, Lyghtesome Gallery is celebrating their 30th Anniversary, and of special significance this June, is the 30th consecutive solo show of work by artist, writer and naturalist, Linda Johns, a resident of James River, Antigonish County. As a determined young artist, Linda Johns originally took on the idea of an annual show as a personal and creative challenge to produce a new substantial body of work every year.  For three decades each show has had a character all its own but with integrative connections to both previous and future endeavours. Continually pushing boundaries in technique and perception throughout her career, Johns is now adept at working with several different mediums in a rhythmic cycle that loosely follows the seasons of the year, carving and sculpting in the summer and into the fall, followed by painting and drawing in the winter, and work in clay progressing slowly over several months along the way.
The 2005 show is entitled “Where has the Quiet Gone” opens Monday June 6th and represents an unprecedented outpouring from the past twelve month cycle.  Johns has produced seven acrylic paintings on paper, eleven acrylic paintings on canvas, six whalebone sculptures, twelve ink-brush drawings, ten acrylic paintings in carved wooden frames and two clay sculptures that have just come out of the kiln at Lyncharm Pottery.  Linda Johns’ life and work is informed and inspired by the mysteries and wonders of the natural world:  the surrounding landscape, the wild creatures, the birds and animals she lives with, plant forms, the weather and the seasons.  Her visionary message of concern and hope is best summed up perhaps most poignantly in what was the last painting to be finished and consequently the shows title piece,  a 48” circular acrylic on canvas “Where has the Quiet Gone”.
It has been a productive year for Linda Johns not only as an artist but as a writer and a teacher as well.  “Birds of a Feather, Tales of a Wild Bird Haven”, Johns’ fifth book about living with wild birds and animals, illustrated with her black and white inkbrush drawings, was just released this spring by Gooselane Press.  The Antigonish Public Library on College St. will host an evening with Linda Johns reading from her new book on June 15 at 7:30pm.
Last fall, Johns was asked to deliver a three-part lecture series on Art and Spirituality at Bethany Centre in Antigonish.  Around the same time, she produced a 2005 calendar with images of her artwork and is working on another one for 2006 in the same format.  There are also plans to self-publish an illustrated book about her summer escapades collecting whalebone in Newfoundland.
The Linda Johns exhibit runs from June 6 - 30, with an additional special venue display at the Bergengren Credit Union at 256 Main St. in Antigonish.  It will be followed by an exhibit at Lyghtesome of Gallery Artists in July.