KELLEY JOHNSON: Elusive Spaces

Luis De Jesus Los Angeles is pleased to present Kelley Johnson: Elusive Spaces a solo exhibition by the Los Angeles-based artist featuring abstract paintings that evoke memory light and atmosphere. The exhibition runs June 14 through July 19 2025 with an opening reception on Saturday June 14 from 4–7 p.m.

Kelley Johnson: Elusive Spaces presents a new body of work that exists in a shifting space between abstraction landscape and dreamscape. Built layer by layer each painting acts as a visual history—an accumulation of gesture memory mood and time driven by an intuitive process that allows emotion and memory to shape the composition. Johnson’s paintings are deeply process-driven. Each piece begins with repetitive linear marks—grids lines and textures—that are gradually disrupted by gestural responses and intuitive decisions. “My paintings are built moment by moment thought by thought” Johnson explains. “Each layer responds to what came before leaving traces of decisions and hesitations visible on the surface.”

Influenced by Color Field painting Impressionism Abstract Expressionism and Hard-Edge Abstraction Johnson pushes the boundaries of paint to create experiential works. Through the use of geometric patterns organic and hard-edge grids vibrant color palettes and materials like glitter flashe paint and burlap Kelley’s mixed media paintings open and close with the viewer’s position. Surfaces shift between matte and glossy hard-edge and blurred with a dynamic push and pull that creates optical depth and breathable space for visual meditation.

“I’m drawn to light space time and atmosphere” Johnson says. “Sometimes a painting is a flicker of memory or a passing impression from the day. It can be specific but I want it to remain open enough for viewers to bring their own experience. It can be a mood a temperature a sense of weather. A visual atmosphere that lives just outside the edge of language.” The paintings in Elusive Spaces invite viewers into liminal spaces—between walking and dreaming memory and presence—where time slips and emotion lingers— holding space for feeling. In each work the artist’s love for what he deems as the “magic of painting” is palpable —an elusive experience to be felt as much as seen.

Kelley Johnson (b.1973 Houston TX) holds an MFA from Indiana University a BFA from Parsons School of Design and a Yale University Even Battle Stoeckel Fellow. Recent solo exhibitions include David Castillo Gallery Miami FL; Fredric Snitzer Gallery Miami FL; Hollywood Art and Culture Center Hollywood FL; Freight and Volume Gallery New York NY; Arts and Leisure Gallery New York NY. Public Art Commissions include Art in Public Place Virgin Voyages Terminal Miami FL; FedEx Headquarters Miami International Airport; Untitled Art Fair Miami Beach FL; Locust Projects Public Art Installation at the Grove at Grand Bay Coconut Grove FL. Notable collections include Perez Art Museum Miami FL Art in Public Places MD Daum Museum of Contemporary Art MO Related Group Citi Group Morgan Stanley and UBS Bank.

You may also like the following events from Luis De Jesus Los Angeles:

• This Saturday, 14th June, 10:00 am, STRINGS ATTACHED: QUEERING PROXIMITIES in Los Angeles
• This Saturday, 14th June, 10:00 am, FRANCISCO MASÓ: Documentary Abstraction in Los Angeles