Johnna

Artist Response Interviewee: Johnna
Interview Date: 4/22/15

The interview with Johanna started off with some nervousness from both sides. Johanna told me of her problems of over complicating things and this affected the process extremely. 
This is the response she sent me before the actual interview:

"Exposure to me has a host of different meanings. On a positive note, I think it just means having courage to expose one’s identity through the world, and I can choose to do that through art— exposure is eye opening. It forces us to positively or negatively experience the world around us. Just today, in my psych class, which is based on therapeutic practices for children, the word exposure came up. But, in a less optimistic way, it was in reference to how maltreated children are exposed to abuse, neglect, and other things that are far beyond their maturity level. With something as general as the word “exposure,” I find myself searching for a single meaning to clutch onto, but I can’t. Maybe I’m exposing myself to that uncertainty. I think exposure in it holds a sense of fear, a sense of vulnerability to the world. To me, I think exposure links with courage. Courage to show oneself, and courage to see."

She focused a lot of the “idea” and definition of exposure instead of what it meant her life until I asked her. When I started this process, I tended to do the same thing, which is important, but the definition can become distorted when it becomes entwined with how a person perceives it.
I asked her how her definition above dealt with her personal experience of exposure. She talked a lot of how fear drives her. She is fascinated with death within her own artwork and she described how that is connected to her extreme fear of it.  She continued to describe relationships and the fear of opening up herself to any relationship because of the fear of getting hurt (exposing herself in small section at a time) .Yet, when I asked her if it is her driving factor to courage she said yes. I could feel her limit her own responses to me as I spoke we spoke. Early in the conversation she spoke of herself tending to over think things and I believe while speaking with me she was doing this same thing.