Lois Johnson spent her childhood in the misty rolling hills of the
Santa Cruz mountains. There she was surrounded by lush green farmland to the
east and the majestic pacific coast on the west. The eyes and mind of this child
joyously absorbed the beauty and thus began the arduous journey of becoming an
artist/painter.
As a young adult she moved to the
Southwest U. S. where, for the next twenty-seven years, she lived, studied and
worked as an artist. The newness of Northern Arizona with its native people
inspired her to devote all her time and energy learning to know and paint the
Hopi and Navajo people and their lovely children. Her work was recognized from
the 1960’s through the 1980’s by collectors of southwest art. Lois is included
in Contemporary Western Artists, Who’s Who in the West and
Who’s Who in America.
She studied with many highly respected
artists including; Donald Puttman, Wilson Hurley, Bettina Steinke, Charles
Movalli, John Sanden, George Carlson, Richard Goetz and Gregg Kreutz of Art
Students League, N. Y., and above all Clair Fry and Ben Stahl, who were
considered masters of the generation of Norman Rockwell, N.C Wyeth and Maxfield
Parrish.
In 1987 the sea, rolling hills and verdant truck
farms called her to return to California to record her as yet unpainted
childhood memories—not as she remembered them, but as if through the eyes of her
most esteemed mentors — Cezanne, Sisley, Monet and Bonnard. She traveled along
the coast in her small RV in the late 1980’s and 1990’s painting "en plein aire".
In 1995, at a workshop with Charles Movalli, she "found" her soul mate painting
(inconspicuously but in a white heat of ferocious concentration) behind a barn
apart from the rest of the class. Ron Grauer. It was his masterful influence
that solidified her approach to the California landscape.
Today, she shares a studio with husband, Ron Grauer in the Santa Cruz mountains
where they continue to paint "their California". Lois and Ron bring
impressive careers to their active painting schedules and are considered premier
artists in their field.
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